Seven Ways to Die Trying
by Gizmobunny
Summary: AU. The Ouran Institute for Juvenile Reform is where rich parents send their kids when they are sick of dealing with them. But that's just for show. Haruhi Fujioka is about to learn what an extraordinary secret this playground for rich children holds.
1. Chapter 1

_I wanted to write a story where they were all bad eggs. So I did. Welcome to Ouran Institute for Juvenile Reform - version 2.0. Some big changes have been made in this revision, things that change the characters and the plot, but work better overall for me. For those who followed the first version, a lot of this will seem familiar. For those who haven't... enjoy._

_**A couple of warnings** about this story - it's AU, as mentioned in the summary, so there are some canon details that have been changed. Pasts have been played with, which in change messes with personalities a bit. Or, in some cases, a lot. I took into account how some of the characters might act if they had been raised differently, and while most of the changes are subtle, I feel it's my duty to warn you that this story contains the periodic use of dark!Hunny, in the interest of experimentation. I know that doesn't appeal to everybody, so if it's not your thing then here's your warning. _

_Also, it's come to my attention in the past few weeks that there are some inconsistencies in characterization in the earlier chapters, so a second revision might go up sometime soon. It won't halt new chapters coming out, and I will make author's notes if major plot points have been affected. _

* * *

**_Seven Ways to Die Trying._**

**_._**

**_._**

**_._**

**_Chapter One._**

She had never seen a stained glass window in a restroom. After all, toilets were places of practicality, not fashion. But there it was, above the potted plant, letting in slanted blue and green light. It was the prettiest thing in the room, Haruhi mused, looking down at her men's department sweater and severely bitten nails. She smirked. Perfect.

It could be said she threw together the outfit just to spite her aunt, but that was not entirely true. It had little to do with spite and more to do with the pleasure she got out of seeing Etsuko Saitō have a cow. With short, mussed hair and ancient loafers, she was the epitome of androgyny. And it was not as though Great Aunt Etsuko could hate Haruhi any more than she already did. Her grandniece was a criminal as far as she was concerned. A blemish on the family tree. A blemish that must be hidden far, far away.

That was what Haruhi Fujioka was doing in reform school.

Still smiling in spite of herself, she pushed open the restroom door and came face to face with the most handsome boy she had ever seen.

He was lounging in an armchair, a textbook perched haphazardly in the crook of one arm. Auburn hair fell into his fox-like face; he appeared to be sleeping. Haruhi planned to sneak past him, but a sudden voice stopped her.

"You _do_ know," the boy said, "that that's the girls' toilet, right?" He opened his eyes and looked up at Haruhi.

She deadpanned, a mix of amusement and offense swirling in her chest. She knew she did not look like a girl, but she had never imagined that...

"Y... yes I know that," she stammered, but before she could argue further the boy closed his eyes and waved a careless hand in the air.

Haruhi scoffed and turned on her heel. _Screw it_. He would find out sooner or later. She was stuck in this place for eternity, after all.

Ouran Institute for Juvenile Reform was unlike any place Haruhi had ever seen. It was a sprawling mansion, like Versailles, with crystal chandeliers and picture windows and golden sconces. She past a bust on a pedestal; a giant oil painting of a garden; a set of French doors leading to a small room lined with bookshelves. She grimaced. Why spend so much money on a home for delinquents? They were only going to mess it all up.

Etsuko was waiting outside the administration office, a sour look on her face. Her black perm and intense eyebrows gave her the appearance of an upset pug.

"You've kept everyone waiting. What on earth were you doing? Go apologize to the secretary. _Now_." She puckered her burgundy lips. It looked as though she was about to swallow an unpleasant lozenge.

Haruhi pushed open the door and entered the office. Dark red velvet seemed to line the room, and she felt slightly suffocated. The woman behind the desk looked to be in her forties, and she had a long face like a horse. She held up something small and gold.

"Here's your room key, Miss Fujioka!" She gave a toothy grin. Haruhi half expected her to whinny. "Just upstairs, down the main corridor, take a left at the end, another left by the big painting, and your room should be at the end of that hall."

Haruhi glared at the key. _155_. Much to her distaste, the secretary kept speaking.

"I'm sure you'll like your neighbors! There's a sweet foreign girl in 154. Why don't you give her a visit?"

_Not a chance_. "I'll be sure to do that. Thanks." She gave a forced smile.

Haruhi trudged out of the office and bumped right into Etsuko. The fur coat absorbed any impact.

"Listen to me," the woman said, taking Haruhi's chin in one hand. "None of your _strange_ stuff, do you hear? I don't want to hear you've been up to any of that, or it's overseas for you." Her eyes were like fire.

"I understand," Haruhi murmured, not really meaning it. "You don't have to worry."

"I _mean_ it." The tirade was not over. "One wrong move and I swear you will never see your father again. I will always regret not removing you from that hovel sooner. It would have done you a lot of good..."

There was more. A lot more. Haruhi just stopped listening. Her eyes wandered around the room, falling on the intricate lamps and patterns in the tile floors. A man in a tuxedo walked past and gave her a sympathetic look.

_They have _butlers _here? What the-_

"Are you listening to me?" Etsuko furrowed her brow. She did not wait for an answer. "Get on upstairs and get changed out of that wretched sweater. And remember what I said."

Haruhi hurried. She could not get away from her aunt sooner. Dragging her oversized duffel behind her, she climbed the steps as fast as her lazy, slow legs could manage. Upon reaching the top she went through an archway and found herself in a long, wood-paneled hall. There were no windows; only door after door, each with a number and a name.

_110 - Miyake... 111 - Oshiro... 112 - Suoh..._

She made a right and came to a hall lined with nothing but windows on either side. There were little cushioned benches and potted plants beneath the massive windows, which overlooked the gardens and rainy landscape. It was a satisfyingly dreary day.

Finally she came to 155. It was the next to last room at the end of the long corridor, and her feet were beginning to ache when she reached it. She unlocked the door, noting the plaque already filled in with her name, and stumbled into her room.

She gaped.

The first thing she noticed was the bay window. The window seat, scattered with tasseled pillows, was at least the size of a small sofa. It overlooked the sprawling back lawn, all the way down to the lake, which was just barely visible through the trees. The Institute sat on innumerable acres of wild land, she knew, and it seemed that she could see at least half of them from here.

There was a four-poster double bed covered in a soft, pristine comforter; a large desk made from dark, nice-smelling wood; a towering armoire with room for even her aunt's entire wardrobe; and a bathroom with a glass-walled tub, a deep ceramic wash-basin, and fluffy towels hanging on ornate fixtures. It reminded her of a five star hotel she had once visited with Aunt Etsuko. She had sampled English tea and delicious scones, and made believe that she was the Queen of England.

Haruhi frowned and tossed her duffle onto the bed.

_What an ugly room_.

She collapsed beside her bag and stared out the window. Etsuko's words passed briefly through her mind: _None of your strange stuff, do you hear?_

"Screw you," Haruhi muttered. She sat up and crossed her legs, leaning back onto the fluffy pillows. A thought passed through her mind. What if...

Haruhi closed her eyes. She had done this millions of times before, but it always took the same effort, the same pointed focus. She dug her fingers into the comforter.

The bed lifted off the ground. One inch, two inches, three inches.

No more Aunt Etsuko. No more snooty neighbors.

Six inches... eight inches.

No one here knew her. She could be as rude and hostile as she wanted.

Haruhi reached up, touched the ceiling, and smirked.

* * *

_Yep. Haruhi can manipulate gravity. I told you I made some big changes, some of which were for my personal enjoyment._

_This was more or less a teaser. I cut off the first chapter halfway through since it was dragging, and I figured having part of it posted would give me more motivation._


	2. Chapter 2

_I am very sorry about the ridiculous wait; I didn't realize how popular this story would be right off the bat. I have to admit that this story is not at the forefront of my mind; neither is the fandom. As soon as I posted the first chapter of this story, I got completely engulfed in what is now my main story. But I still have big plans for this one. Without further ado, I present to you Chapter Two. _

* * *

She didn't realize she had fallen asleep until a knock on the door woke her up. Opening her eyes, she was startled to see that the sun had gone down, leaving the room completely dark.

The visitor knocked louder.

"I'm coming." Haruhi rubbed her eyes and reached for her glasses. Her hair was a wreck, standing up in all directions. She made sure it stayed that way.

The door only had one lock. No deadbolt, no bars, nothing to be expected in a reform school. Haruhi turned the knob and found herself face to face with a girl about her age.

"Hi, you must be Haruhi Fujioka! My name's Renge. I'm your next door neighbor, in room 154-" the girl pointed with her thumb "-and I just wanted to come over here and introduce myself since I guess we'll be seeing a lot of each other. Are you about to go down to dinner?"

She said this all in one breath, and seemed hardly winded when she finished.

"Um, I guess so?" Haruhi shrugged.

"Great!" Renge flashed a pearly smile. She had a round, freckled face, done up with all manner of makeup. Her eyelashes were curled perfectly; her cheeks were rosy and pink. Light brown hair was pulled into a high ponytail, and she smelled like peppermint. She gave the appearance of a child trying to look much older; her eyeliner was too thick for her pale skin.

"Let me go grab Reiko, and I'll meet you back here in two minutes!" Renge winked and turned on the spot, her thin ponytail whipping around like a ribbon. Mentally exhausted by the encounter, Haruhi retreated into the dorm room. She switched on a lamp and headed for the window seat. Fresh air was what she needed. She cranked the window open and stuck her head into the warm August night.

The Ouran Institute sat on innumerable acres of wild land, and Haruhi was sure she could see at least half of it from this window. Her room overlooked a large lawn; directly below her was a garden. There was a stone bench, a little wrought iron trellis, and a fountain in the shape of an angel. Not a piece of Japanese decor in sight; the headmaster was obviously an Anglophile.

She was just about to close the window and resign herself to dinner when something small fell from above and landed on her neck. She groaned, assuming that a bird had done something gross above her head. But when she reached up hesitantly, she didn't find bird droppings. Her hand came back with a cigarette butt.

"Hello?" Scowling, Haruhi looked upward.

A child looked back.

At first he might have been the angel from the fountain. A cloud of light blonde hair, almost white, hung into his huge, blue eyes. His face was round, handsome, and dimpled. But in the yellow flood lights Haruhi saw dark circles beneath his eyes. There was something almost frightening about him. His smile was too wide to be genuine.

"Hi!" he called back in a juvenile voice. "Are you my new downstairs neighbor?"

Haruhi scowled harder. He smelled like sugar, even from a distance. "Yes. And you dropped this on my head."

The kid pulled a mortified face, and for a moment Haruhi felt bad for being harsh. But when he spoke, his voice was so coated with sugar that it could not have been honest. "I'm so sorry! I had no idea you were down there." He leaned farther out of his window, so that his hair hid his eyes from view. "You won't tell anyone, will you?" It almost sounded like a threat.

"Of course not." Haruhi rolled her eyes, then slid back onto the cushion and closed her window behind her.

_An elementary kid smoking. Can things get weirder?_

_

* * *

_

They could, and they did.

Reiko Kanazuki was the living poster child for the "Emo Girl" stereotype. She wore her heavy hair in long Wednesday Addams pigtails, tied with black ribbons, and her face seemed stuck in a solemn, downtrodden frown. She had black combat boots; her purple sweater was a size too large, and the sleeves hung far past her hands; her eyes, partly hidden by thick bangs, were lined excessively in deep black. There was almost something sickly about the way she held herself, ever on edge.

On the way to dinner, Renge did the talking for all three. She raved mostly about her own feelings on several topics, from soap operas to technological advancements, leaving room for neither discussion nor awkward silences. Haruhi occasionally slipped in a response for good measure; Reiko kept her lips pressed tightly closed, but hummed appreciatively when addressed.

"It's really not that bad here once you get used to it. Right, Reiko?"

"Mm-hmm."

Haruhi couldn't help but wonder about the girls' friendship. She had derived from Renge's mindless chatter that the two of them spent a great deal of time together out of class, and they seemed to have fun. Obviously Renge made the decisions and the conversations, but what puzzled Haruhi was why Reiko followed.

Renge had one redeeming factor: she had realized that Haruhi was indeed a girl.

"So do you have a boyfriend back home?" she asked eagerly.

"Um, no."

Renge squealed. "Well we'll just have to find you one. Right, Reiko?"

Reiko did not answer; she gave Renge a look that said, _Imbecile_.

As soon as they stepped through the dining hall's glass doors, Renge threw an arm in front of Haruhi.

"God of the Sun, nine o' clock," she breathed. Haruhi followed her gaze to the left side of the crowded room, where a boy whom she could only assume was supposed to be handsome, was pouring himself a cup of tea.

"Hmm." Haruhi nodded in acknowledgement. The boy's neck was too long. His golden hair was over-styled.

"You don't even know who that is, do you? That's terrible! Reiko, isn't that terrible?" Renge shook her best friend's shoulder.

"Mmm-hmm," Reiko replied.

Renge turned to Haruhi with a dramatic air. "You are looking at Tamaki Suoh, King of the Ouran Institute. I'm president of his fan club."

Haruhi did not doubt this.

"He runs the Host Club, which - this is our table, right here - which has lots of parties and stuff. You should come by their room with us tomorrow. It's Luau Day."

"Um, alright." It sounded like the stupidest thing in the world. "That would be great."

The food was neither gruel nor unrecognizable delicacy. Haruhi was pleased. She shoveled rice into her mouth as Renge went into flowery detail about the Host Club and its members. So far they all sounded outright horrible.

"My favorite, of course, is Kyouya. Handsome, courteous, intelligent, one hundred percent perfect!" She sighed dreamily, staring up at the chandelier.

"Are you going to eat that roll? The kitchen's all out?"

Haruhi was shaken out of her trance by a familiar voice. She looked up and saw the red-haired boy from earlier, accompanied by... his identical twin? Haruhi blinked slowly.

"Hikaru!" Renge squealed. "Take all the rolls you want!" There was only one on her plate. He stuffed it in his mouth and turned to Haruhi.

" 'Ey!" He swallowed. "You're that guy from earlier." He dropped into the seat beside her, and his twin leaned over the back. "The one who went in the girls' room by mistake."

"_Hikaru_!" Renge gasped, leaning so far over the table that her long hair grazed Haruhi's plate. "That's no way to talk to a girl!"

Hikaru's face momentarily went as red as his hair, but he recovered quickly and swapped an amused look with his twin.

"We're sorry," the twin said, sticking out his lower lip a little. "Your 80s sweater and tragic haircut kind of threw us off."

"Yeah, Kaoru and I are allergic to tacky clothing, so we didn't exactly look twice. Forgive us?" Hikaru held out his hand, and Haruhi grimaced as she reached out to shake it.

"So," Kaoru said, "what're you in for?"

"Excuse me?" Haruhi turned to face him. Up close, there were a slew of differences between the brothers; Hikaru's ears were too big, and Kaoru's hair wasn't as bright.

Kaoru sneered. "You know - what'd you do to get sent to this hellhole?"

"Did you burn down a house?" Hikaru leaned forward, a Cheshire Cat smile on his face.

"Freak out the neighbors?"

"Steal a car?"

"I still don't think Mori-senpai did that."

"Or," Hikaru finished, "are you just plain dangerous?"

Haruhi was taken aback. "I didn't do any of that stuff. I don't even _know_ why I'm here." It was a lie, but it was better than explaining her screwed-up family to all of these rich kids.

Hikaru clutched his heart and said melodramatically,"Agh, an innocent soul! I feel almost pure just sitting next to her."

"As if." Renge snorted into her glass of water.

Kaoru rounded the table and patted her on the back. "This one's here for 'having the potential to rob a bank'." He used air quotes.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Haruhi raised one eyebrow.

"It means-" Hikaru leaned back dangerously in his seat "-that she was deemed a hazard to the general public because of-"

"_Hikaru_, the last two pages of your biology notes are nothing but doodles! You said I could borrow them but this is no help at all!"

Hikaru crossed his arms over his chest. "It was your mistake to ask me in the first place, Boss. Borrow Kyouya-senpai's next time."

Haruhi looked up and noted that Tamaki Suoh was no more handsome up close as he had been from across the room. In fact, his anger regarding Hikaru's notes made him even less so. He looked a bit like a disgruntled child, his blue eyes buggy with emotion as he slammed the notes back onto the table.

"You should stay angry," Hikaru said. "It's amusing."

Kaoru grabbed the notes and flipped through them. "Hikaru, most of this isn't even right."

"So what?" He was tipping back in his chair again. "It's not like you can flunk out of reform school. FYI, no one else wants kids like us." He motioned to the rest of the table, then looked at Haruhi. "Truants, bank robbers, freaky psychics - how much do you know about this place?"

Renge scowled. Before Haruhi could open her mouth she cut in, "I am _not_ a bank robber, Hikaru Hitachiin. Would you please just _stop_ that rumor? And Reiko isn't 'freaky', she-"

"Wait, what?"

All five of the students, including Tamaki, turned to look at Haruhi.

"Psychic... What are you talking about? Are you serious?" Haruhi gave Hikaru an angry, harassed look.

"You mean..." Renge's hand flew to her mouth. "Are you _normal?"_ She said it incredulously, as though "normal" was the worst trait a person could be cursed with.

Kaoru gave a sardonic chuckle. "Way to be subtle, Renge."

Haruhi could hardly speak, she was so confused. Were these people completely crazy? Had she been sent to an insane asylum by accident?

"I have no idea what you're talking about," she said honestly. "What do you mean I'm 'normal'?"

Renge shook her head. "It's not a bad thing, Haruhi. Sometimes I wish I was like everyone else. It's horrible, people always thinking I'm going to rob their house. Not a good way to live."

"Yeah," Hikaru agreed. "It's terrible. Oh, wait - no it's not. You just have sucky powers, Renge." The girl blushed and looked down at her lap.

Haruhi was stunned. Powers? _Powers? _But that meant... She couldn't think straight - had Renge really meant _that?_ Was she just joking? Was it some prank they liked to play on the new girl?

"What the hell is going on?" she demanded through clenched teeth. "What do you mean by-"

"Here," Hikaru said politely, "I'll show you through demonstration." And, with a pleasant smile, he reached up and grabbed the waist of Tamaki's pants.

Haruhi averted her eyes just in time. But while she was boring a hole in the floor, wondering what in the world Hikaru had done that for, she heard a very, _very_ out-of-place sound.

A dog barking. And right on the other side of the table, too. She looked up, and was startled to see that Tamaki Suoh was nowhere to be seen. Instead, there was a small yellow dog yipping at Hikaru, trying to get a hold on his pants leg.

"Funny," Kaoru commented. "He usually turns into a sheep when he's embarrassed."

Haruhi didn't even bother asking. She just stared, her jaw gaping, as the little dog grunted, stuck its tongue out at Hikaru, and trotted out of the cafeteria.

"Well." Hikaru turned to face Haruhi. "I think you get the general idea. So - what can you do?"

For a moment Haruhi remained silent. She saw no point in giving away her secret to all of these strangers. But then, what if there wasn't a point? What if it was just...

"Oh," she answered, thrilled at the strength in her voice, "I'll show you through demonstration."

She snapped her fingers, and Hikaru's chair rocketed five feet in the air. He tumbled out of it, surprised, and stared up in astonishment.

_What if it was just fun? _


	3. Chapter 3

_Chapter Three, in which we learn a little more about the Institute and its eccentric students. _

**

* * *

**

"It's no big deal. I've been able to do it since I was small."

"So, are you the first in your family, or are their others?"

Haruhi clenched her jaw and set her eyes on the tile floor in front of her. While it was a bit refreshing to talk openly about her abilities for the first time in her life, she would rather it have been with anyone other than these three. Renge was following no more than a foot behind her, acting as if Haruhi was a visiting rock star. The twins flanked her on either side, somehow managing to look bored and intrigued at the same time.

"So far as I know I'm the only one," Haruhi told Renge.

Renge nodded eagerly. "Me too! Well, I have an aunt who's psychic, kinda like Reiko, but I'm the only one who can walk through walls and stuff." As if to punctuate this, she reached out and passed her hand through Hikaru's shoulder. Hikaru shuddered.

"I hate when you do that, it makes me itch." He rubbed at the back of his neck.

Kaoru prodded Haruhi in the arm. "Hey, have you met a guy named Kyouya Ootori yet?"

"Renge mentioned him, but I haven't met him yet."

"You need to! He's totally dreamy, I-" Hikaru stepped on Renge's foot, and she stopped abruptly, her cheeks turning red with anger.

Haruhi ignored them. "Why do you ask?"

"Oh, no reason." Kaoru changed the subject: "What grade are you in?"

"I'm a first year."

Hikaru patted her on the back. "Hey, so are the three of us."

"Hey Hikaru," Kaoru said, "why don't we take her by the Club tomorrow?"

"Sounds like a good idea, Kaoru."

Their voices sounded suspicious, as if they had a hidden meaning, but Haruhi was too fed up to think about it. After what seemed like an endless trek, they reached the first year hall and she hurried ahead to her room.

As Haruhi fiddled with her key, Renge yawned widely. "See you guys in the morning," she said with a wave. Then, as though it was the most natural thing in the world, she walked right through her closed door.

"Show off," Kaoru muttered. He slung an arm around his brother's shoulder; Hikaru was cursing fluently at the doorknob.

"Someone really needs to fix this damn thing," he said loudly, handing the key over to his brother.

Haruhi stood in her doorway for a moment. "Wait, why do you two share a room? I thought everyone had their own."

They look she received from both of them could only have been described as devilish.

"That," Hikaru said, "is something you really don't want to know."

Only after Haruhi was in her bathroom, brushing her teeth, did the full meaning of that sentence hit her.

* * *

Breakfast was at eight o' clock, which meant Haruhi had to leave her room no later than 7:50 to avoid meeting up with Renge and the twins.

Too bad for her, they were already in the dining hall. When Renge saw Haruhi, she leapt up and hurried over, looking as though she might wet herself with excitement.

"Haruhi, they're sitting with us! The Host Club is sitting with us!"

Haruhi looked. She saw the twins, the Tamaki guy, a thin-faced boy with glasses, a tall, muscular fellow, and-

"That kid from yesterday," she said aloud. There he was, even smaller up close, sitting next to a petrified Reiko. "He's in the Host Club?"

"Who, Hunny-senpai?" Renge nodded. "He's a second year, would you believe it? Sixteen years old. A childhood illness stunted his growth - he almost died!" She said the last part with morbid excitement. "Have you met him?"

Haruhi frowned. "Not really. He dropped a cigarette on my head." Renge gasped dramatically.

"He's not supposed to have more than one a day!" Her hand flew to her mouth. "How in the world did he sneak it past Mori-senpai?"

Haruhi didn't even ask. "Can we sit down now?" One of the twins was motioning to them, looking irritated.

"Coming!" Renge called to him. She grabbed Haruhi's hand and yanked her towards the table, pushing her down into a chair between herself and Reiko, and across from the thin boy in glasses. He looked incredibly bored until he saw Haruhi, at which point his expression changed entirely.

"Haruhi Fujioka," he said in a cheerful voice. He stuck out his hand, which she shook tentatively. His skin was soft and clean. "I've been looking forward to meeting you."

"Have you?" She suddenly felt nervous. There was something insincere about this guy.

He smiled, and she saw a row of perfect white teeth. "Hikaru and Kaoru told me about your abilities. Would you mind demonstrating?"

Haruhi scowled. "Yes, I _would_ mind."

The whole table laughed, except for Reiko and Tamaki, the latter of whom had a very strange look on his face - the offspring of irritation and confusion. Haruhi ignored him.

"So tell me about this place." She folded her arms over her chest and looked each of the guys in the eye in turn (with the exception of the tall one, whom she felt might have killed her). "Is everyone here like us?"

Hunny, the short one, beamed at her. "Yep. We're all gifted." He was licking powdered sugar from a crepe off his fingers one by one. Reiko was trying very hard not to watch.

"Every person in this school was sent here because their abilities weren't accepted at home," Kyouya explained. "They do an excellent job of covering it all up, of course. We operate under the front of being an elite correction facility, easily disguised as your typical boarding school for parents who want to save face."

"Now, no rich parent wants to admit to anyone that their child is unusual," Hikaru cut in. "That's what our expertly trained psychics are for."

Kaoru nodded. "They have face-to-face admissions interviews, and they look into the client's memories to find out if the kid has powers or not."

Haruhi raised one eyebrow and looked around the table again. "You're serious? _Psychics_?" But inside, her mind was racing, trying to imagine what things the experts had seen in Etsuko's memories. Had they seen a yapping Shih Tzu floating up and up until it touched the ceiling? Had they seen a bicycle bored into the ground? Children screaming and pointing? Or, perchance, had they seen the ruins of a small garden shed, collapsed under some unseen weight?

"If you're who you say you are," Kyouya said, "then you shouldn't be at all surprised." He took a final sip of orange juice and stood up from the table. "Come by the fourth floor gallery today at three. There are some things I'd like to run by you." Then, he left.

Renge could hardly contain her grin a moment longer. "Isn't he just dreamy?" she burst out. The twins groaned.

"If you're forty, maybe," Kaoru said. "I just don't get what you see in him."

"Where do I start?" Renge tapped her chin in thought. "There's-"

Kaoru shook his head violently. "Nevermind, I don't think I want to know." His brother laughed and slung an arm around Kaoru's neck.

Haruhi looked up at the clock. "When does breakfast end?"

"Nine o' clock!" Hunny piped up, stuffing the last bite of crepe in his mouth.

It was only half past eight.

"I'm just gonna leave now." Haruhi stood up, grabbed her satchel, and was gone before anyone could stop her.

* * *

Five minutes into her first class, Haruhi made up her mind on something - academics at Ouran were taken about as seriously as their security. It was not surprising in the least, although it was admittedly disappointing. She _liked_ school. School was comfortable and fun. But this? This wasn't school.

It looked enough like a classroom. There were academic posters on the wall, ordinary shades on the windows, and there was no crystal chandelier in sight. The primary difference was that the mahogany desks could have seated an entire family for dinner, with room left for condiments. Haruhi took a desk near the back, far away from the other students, and pulled out her notebook and pencil. By the time the twins, Renge, and Reiko arrived, all the desks around Haruhi had been filled. She gave a sigh of relief as they took desks near the front.

The teacher entered the room ten minutes late, which should have been the first sign. She had winged glasses perched on her nose, and her dark ringlets were tangled and windswept.

"Don't bother," she said dramatically when a student up front tried to take out his calculator. "The damned air conditioner in my car is out again. I'm not feeling like geometry today." She sank into her desk chair and let out a sigh through her violently carmine lips.

"Mrs. Numata?" Several girls near the window shot their hands in the air immediately. "Can we go to the bathroom." The teacher's only answer was the wave of a hand, and the girls were gone in moments.

The remaining forty minutes passed quickly. Most of the students left the room with various excuses, and the twins seemed to have momentarily forgotten Haruhi; they were deep in conversation with Renge. Only at the very end of class did they migrate to Haruhi's desk and slap their arms around her shoulders.

"You know," Hikaru said, "I have a feeling we're going to be the best of friends."

Haruhi tried not to laugh. She shook his arm off of her back. "What makes you think that?"

"You haven't been here long enough to notice," Kaoru explained, "but popularity in this place is ranked not by looks or money, but by powers."

Hikaru nodded in agreement. "People like us-" he motioned to the three of them, and Renge scowled "-are top of the food chain."

"And people like these two," Kaoru added, indicating a fuming Renge and a generally apathetic Reiko, "are at the bottom."

"Ex_cuse_ me." Renge crossed her arms over her flat chest. "Who else at this school can waltz into a locked room? Who else in this school can see the future?"

Hikaru snorted. "And who else in this school can turn into a dinosaur? Sense somebody coming from a mile away? Make an entire room of people go temporarily blind?"

Haruhi gaped, momentarily forgetting her apathetic demeanor. "Wait, who can do all that stuff?"

"Pretty amazing, huh?" Hikaru said with a smirk. "Well, Haruhi, welcome to the Host Club."

"You already saw Boss last night, when he turned into the dog," Kaoru began. "He's a shapeshifter. Comes in handy at the Club - girls love puppies."

"Kyouya-senpai has super senses," Renge cut in. "He can hear a pin drop in another room, or know who's behind him before they even make a sound. He's amazing!" She made him sound like some kind of superhero.

"But Hunny-senpai has one of the coolest powers here," Hikaru finished, as though he was telling a ghost story around a fire. "He controls the senses - he can make you go blind or deaf, or feel whatever he wants you to feel."

Kaoru grinned. "Pretty freaky, huh?"

Haruhi considered this. "I guess. But what can you guys do? You haven't mentioned that." As soon as the words left her mouth, she wanted to take them back. The twins' faces lit up with excited pride.

"This," they said together. They snapped their fingers, and at once a flock of small canaries appeared, chirping and swooping above Haruhi's head. She fought to conceal her surprise, but when the birds vanished and were replaced by miniature fireworks she had to smile. The twins snapped again, and the fireworks turned into a group of tiny fairies that landed on Haruhi's desk and began dancing some kind of ballet.

"Wow..." she breathed, watching as one of the fairies did a perfect pirouette. The others cheered, their clothes and wings shimmering. Then, they all disappeared with a _pop_.

"Amazing, isn't it?" Renge seemed to have forgotten her anger, and had a dreamy expression on her freckled face.

Hikaru stretched his arms over his head. "Try not to be too intimidated."

"I'm not," Haruhi said, a little too quickly. "So would you mind telling me what this Kyouya guy's interest in me is all about?"

The twins exchanged an unreadable look, then shook their heads.

"You'll just have to find out this afternoon," Hikaru answered.

Haruhi regretted asking. Willing the day to be over as soon as possible, she slumped down in her seat and sighed.


	4. Chapter 4

_In which Kyouya's mysterious intentions are revealed, and we discover just how horrible these boys can be._

_A little shorter than I planned, but I was having trouble with the next section and just decided to cut it in half and go ahead and post this._

* * *

The rest of her classes proved to be just as pointless and boring as the first. If Haruhi learned anything that day, it had nothing to do with academics - the twins made sure of that. During the very few classes where the teacher actually lectured, Haruhi was distracted by tiny animals walking casually across her desk. She looked over to see Hikaru and Kaoru at least halfway absorbed in class; they were good at their illusions, there was no denying it. Haruhi propped her notebook up in her lap, trying to hide the little prancing zebras and unicorns from view.

The final bell rang shortly after three, and Haruhi collected her things and stormed out of the room as fast as possible. Unfortunately, she was still too slow for the Hitachiin twins.

"Did you like our handiwork?" Hikaru smirked.

"Was that _really_ necessary?" Haruhi asked with a deep sigh. Getting angry would only satisfy them, she knew. But the twins just hurried ahead, their strides identical, and pretended their didn't hear her.

Renge struggled to close the faulty strap on her satchel. "You guys had better hurry," she said to the twins. "The doors open at 3:45, and you still have to give Haruhi the rundown."

'The rundown about _what_?"

"You'll find out in just a few minutes." Hikaru grabbed one of Haruhi's hands and tugged her down the hall.

The Ouran Institute had once been a grand mansion belonging to an Anglophile - Haruhi knew that from her aunt's initial ravings. Sections had been added over the past one hundred years, built to the tastes of the various owners, so the floor-plan made very little sense to a newcomer. The broad marble halls of the second floor, where the classrooms were, had an almost Italian appearance, but the left hand wing was wood-paneled and crimson-carpeted, with brass Victorian light fixtures. It smelled like roses and old books. Haruhi felt like she was in some sort of secret passage beneath the school.

"The galleries are on the fourth floor," Hikaru explained. "That's all that's up there, besides some old science labs."

Haruhi was speechless as they rounded another corner and went up a narrow stairwell. The rounded landing had a window seat, on which two girls in short skirts were holding hands and thumbing through a magazine.

"Good afternoon, ladies," Kaoru greeted as they passed, but neither girl acknowledged him. As soon as the three reached the top of the stairs and were out of earshot, Kaoru's shoulders dropped. "I wish there was some way we could reach _all_ the girls in the school," he said dramatically. Haruhi raised one eyebrow.

"Just what I was thinking." Hikaru feigned distress. "What is the point of a Host Club if we can't cater to such a large portion of the female population?"

Haruhi snorted. "Isn't that taking things a little far? You make it sound like some kind of charity."

The twins exchanged another mysterious look, then pulled Haruhi up another stairwell. A tarnished brass plaque (or _was _it brass?) read "Fourth Floor: Labs, Galleries". Haruhi wrinkled her nose at the strengthening smell of flowers. Hikaru and Kaoru were obviously not going to answer, so she sighed and tried to distract herself from whatever horrors were waiting upstairs.

Just as they reached the top of the stairs, a loud, familiar voice rang out, just barely muffled by the thin walls:

"_Takashi, it's not fair! I haven't had one today, you said I could have one after lunch! IT'S AFTER LUNCH!"_

Hikaru sighed. "I don't know whose side to take. On one hand I want Hunny-senpai to quit, but on the other hand..."

"... this is getting really annoying," Kaoru finished. "I would just give it to him already." He looked over at Haruhi. "He started smoking when he was only fourteen."

"That's horrible." Haruhi frowned, looking at each of the twins in turn. They didn't seem to concerned by it, which just irritated her more. "Aren't you guys concerned for his health?"

Hikaru smiled, then reached out and pinched Haruhi's cheek. "Aw, aren't you so cute?" She gave him a death glare.

"Mori cares about him," Kaoru said, "and that's good enough."

"Yeah," Hikaru agreed, "I wouldn't mind if he dropped dead this afternoon."

_These are horrible people_, Haruhi thought with disgust. _What did I do to deserve this?_ She adjusted her glasses and pulled ahead, out of their reach. No sooner had she taken a step than two large double doors opened in front of her, and she almost collided with a tall figure emerging from them.

"There you are!" Tamaki Suoh crossed his arms over his chest and glared down at the twins, ignoring Haruhi. "We thought you'd forgotten!"

Hikaru rolled his eyes. "We're not dumb, Boss. But you, on the other hand..."

"Changing Club to Monday just so that Aimi whore can come?" Kaoru screwed up his face in mock disgust.

"Someone has a little crush..."

The twins pushed past Tamaki, leaving Haruhi in the doorway. She looked up, already desperately bored, and met a pair of large, indigo eyes. For a split second she felt her heart skip, no doubt from sheer anger.

"What the hell are you looking at?" She looked away, scowling.

Tamaki blanched. "Mom, she just cursed at me! Are you _sure_ she's the one?" He whirled around and gestured to Kyouya, who was sitting at a table and writing on a clipboard.

"Ah, Miss Fujioka," he said pleasantly. "Do come in." Reluctantly, she stepped over the threshold and into a gigantic, glossy-floored room. It looked like an old ballroom, with elaborate tiled floors and a piano in one corner. Tables were set up around the room, each with candles and flowers in the middle.

"Welcome to the Ouran High School Host Club." Kyouya motioned around the room, and each of the boys gave a deep bow. "I believe you are acquainted with each member?"

Haruhi nodded. She had not formally met anyone but Kyouya and the twins, but she had no desire to hear any of them talk more than necessary.

"So what did you want me for?" she asked harshly.

Hikaru was the one to answer. "Remember what Kaoru and I were saying on the way here?"

"Yes." Haruhi sat down at one of the tables. Much to her distaste, Kyouya joined her.

"Many of our bisexual customers have expressed interest in a female Host for quite some time." He ran a hand through his hair and smiled, showing his perfect teeth again. Haruhi wondered whether he was supposed to be charming or frightening. "You see, we are all about fulfilling the wishes of our clients, and based on estimations the addition of a female Host would increase our profit by half."

Haruhi gaped. "Wait, you only asked me up here because I look like a lesbian?"

The twins burst out laughing. Tamaki chewed at his nails. But Kyouya only smiled in an unnerving way.

"Hikaru? Kaoru? Mori-senpai?" He turned to face the three boys. "Would you please do me a favor and go water those plants outside the door?"

To Haruhi's surprise, the twins did as told. They trudged out of the room, followed by Mori, and closed the door firmly behind them. It was becoming clear that Kyouya Ootori was not to be questioned.

"Miss Fujioka, I must admit I haven't been entirely honest with you." Kyouya stood up and moved towards Hunny, who was lounging on the window seat. "There is indeed another reason, one that not even the other club members are aware of. Two months ago, Hunny-senpai relayed some disturbing information to me regarding future events."

Haruhi pursed her lips and observed him carefully. "I thought Reiko was the psychic."

Kyouya smiled. "Yes, but she is a primary client of Hunny-senpai's. Lucky for us, he's the only person she will talk to freely, aside from Renge."

Hunny seemed to have pulled himself out of his funk; he smiled, a deep dimple appearing. "She tells me _every_thing, like all the visions and stuff she has."

"Two months ago," Kyouya repeated, "Reiko told Hunny-senpai about one vision in particular which she found important."

"She said," he began, leaning over the back of Haruhi's chair, "that something horrible was going to happen soon at Ouran."

Haruhi was unimpressed. The smell of caramel and cigarettes was making her dizzy. "And what makes her say that?"

"She saw a new headmaster, a big fire-" Hunny gestured wildly with his hands "-and a bunch of people crying. She said someone was gonna die, but she wouldn't tell me who." He chewed at his lower lip, and for a moment Haruhi saw something like worry.

"Haruhi," Kyouya said cooly, "I know all this must seem crazy, and I would be surprised if you believed every word we are saying. But hear me out - I've been feeling the same bad vibrations as Reiko, and even Tamaki here has heard some unsettling things involving-"

"Is that why you kept me here? Just to say that?" Tamaki narrowed his eyes childishly.

"-our current headmaster. That's why, in the past couple of months, we have begun to plan." Kyouya moved back towards Haruhi. His voice was flat and unconcerned. "We have no idea what exactly is in store for Ouran - all we know is from Reiko's visions, and even then there is a lot of guesswork. But we do know that when the time comes, we will need to escape. And to do that, we will need power. The six of us already hold some of the more extraordinary gifts in the school, but it isn't enough. There is no telling what we will be up against."

"Wait." Haruhi shook her head. "You're _collecting_ me? For some kind of army?"

"In a way, yes."

"Don't think of it as 'collecting'", Tamaki threw in. "You're being recruited for a good cause. You should be proud!" He pumped a fist in the air, but his jubilation was not contagious.

Haruhi groaned. "You have got to be kidding me," she said to no one in particular. Then, looking up at Kyouya: "Supposing I do join this... _thing_. What's in it for me?"

Kyouya smirked. "I knew you would say that." He adjusted his glasses and sat back down. "How does ¥10,000 sound?"

"¥10,000?" Haruhi struggled to keep her jaw from dropping. That was enough for... how many months of groceries?

"Then it's settled. You start officially next Monday." Kyouya nodded curtly. "Tamaki, will you give Haruhi the grand tour before the girls arrive? Hunny-senpai, will you please fetch the others from the hall? Open the door carefully, Hikaru and Kaoru have their ears pressed against it."

Haruhi looked up at Tamaki, who gave her a goofy grin. "So what do you think about the school?" he asked brightly.

"It's better than being at home," Haruhi told him bluntly, and his face fell. She backpedaled. "I mean, it's nice and all. Much better than I was expecting when I heard 'reform school'."

Tamaki smiled again. "My father doesn't believe that bars and guards promote good behavior. Besides, this isn't a reform school at all - it's a safe haven."

"Your father?" Haruhi repeated, raising one brow. Tamaki chuckled good-naturedly.

"The headmaster," he corrected himself. "My father's the headmaster."

_Oh_. Haruhi nodded slowly. That explained Kyouya's comment earlier. "Your father sounds like an okay guy."

"He's a _great_ guy," Tamaki said with another toothy grin. "And what about yours? What's your father like?"

Haruhi wasn't sure if _"He sells liquor and crossdresses"_ was an appropriate answer, so she just said, "He's eccentric." Tamaki considered this, looking a bit concerned, and then gave a polite nod.

"Maybe I'll get to meet him one day," he said. "The first Saturday of every month is Visiting Day, you know." Tamaki stuck his pointer finger in the air, as though he was a professor making an important point. Haruhi declined to mention that she had been told this already; she also declined to mention that her father was banned from contacting her, and Visiting Day most certainly fell under that ban.

"Maybe," was all Haruhi said. She stood up and looked around the room. "Aren't you supposed to be giving me a tour, or something?"

Tamaki opened his mouth to answer, but was interrupted when the double doors swung in with a loud _bang_. Hikaru and Hunny stalked in, at each other's throats.

"How was I supposed to know it would scare you so bad? It was just a bit of light jesting, you didn't have to use your freaky volume thing." Hikaru rubbed his temples. "My ears are killing me now, thanks."

Hunny looked murderous. "You did _too_ know it was gonna scare me! Everyone in this club knows!"

"You don't have to get all defensive, I already _said_ I was sorry!"

"No, you didn't!"

Haruhi looked back and forth between the two, then over at Tamaki. "'Freaky volume thing'?" she mumbled.

Tamaki cupped his hand around his mouth and answered, in an ineffective stage whisper, "It's this thing Hunny does-"

"I'd gathered that, thank you."

"-where he makes everything really loud. Like wearing headphones turned up too high. It could drive someone crazy!"

Haruhi nodded slowly. She thought to ask what Hikaru had probably done to scare the kid so badly, but she did not particularly want to know.

At that moment, Hikaru snapped his fingers and a large black dog appeared, barking and foaming at the mouth. It wavered and turned into a shark, which flopped about for a moment before jumping upward and fading into the silhouette of a giant spider.

_I have a feeling I'm going to hate it here_, Haruhi thought as she turned on her heel to leave.


	5. Chapter 5

_My writing time has been ridiculously limited in the past few weeks, which is why this chapter feels a little choppy (and is, admittedly, quite overdue). But I've started making detailed outlines to speed things along, so that should help the direction of this story._

_Now, Chapter Five, in which nothing really happens, but we learn a little more about the school and some of its students._

* * *

She ate breakfast with the Host Club again the next morning. It could have been much worse - Hunny was absent, and Renge and Reiko were still being allowed to sit at the Club's table. Haruhi had to admit that Renge was growing on her a little. She at least seemed to be one of the more polite members of the group.

"Hikaru, Kaoru, Renge." Towards the end of the hour, Kyouya cast his steely eyes at the three. "It's your job to familiarize Haruhi with the school, alright? Introduce her to people, show her the building, et cetera. Can you do that?"

They would not have said no under any circumstances.

"Yes sir," Kaoru said sharply. Hikaru nodded in agreement.

"You won't be disappointed!" Renge looked positively ecstatic at an opportunity to please her idol.

So as soon as the clock struck nine, the twins dragged Haruhi out of the dining hall, maniacal grins on their fox-like faces. Hikaru turned to her, a flash of childish joy in his hazel eyes.

"We're taking the long way to class," he announced, tugging her in the opposite direction of the crowd. While most of the students went up the grand staircase or into the wide hall beneath, the twins dragged Haruhi across the polished limestone floor of the foyer. Dim grey light glowed in the large windows above the entryway, sending shadows across the white coffered ceilings; it was raining again.

"Wait up!" Renge's voice echoed loudly in the massive room. She hurried after them, her mousy braids bouncing against her shoulders. Reiko was not with her, but Haruhi was not interested enough to wonder.

She tried to tug her hand away from Hikaru. "Aren't we gonna be late to class?"

"Stick in the mud." Hikaru stuck his tongue out. "You've got a lot to learn. Watch this." He let go of her and took a few long strides ahead. An older man, apparently a teacher by his sport coat and briefcase, was adjusting his tie in a large, gold-framed mirror.

"Good morning, Sensei. You're looking dashing today." Hikaru grinned at the man.

The teacher smiled good-naturedly. "Will I be seeing you in class this afternoon?"

Hikaru shrugged. "Old habits die hard. I'll try, but you know me."

"Well, just stay out of trouble. Do your homework." The teacher said the last part with an almost comical amount of firmness, as there was still a smile on his wide face. As Hikaru nodded obediently, the man turned and trotted up the staircase.

"Told you." Hikaru checked his reflection in the mirror; he ran a hand through his hair, causing bits of it to stick up haphazardly. "This place is one big farce."

_Disgusting_, Haruhi thought. "Yeah, I was getting that idea."

"Shall we begin our tour?" Hikaru continued, ignoring her. "This over here-" he motioned to a side hall through a large, ornate arch "-is the library and study rooms. No one really studies in there."

"Well," Kaoru added, slinking an arm around Renge's waist, "not _books_, anyway." The girl flushed red up to her hairline, then pulled away with a pout.

"And that hallway," Renge went on, her voice a little too high and loud, "leads to-"

Hikaru interrupted: "The middle school, and the greenhouses. Come on, we've got a lot of ground to cover."

Haruhi missed her second geometry class, and half of her English class. Normally she would have fought to the finish to get back to class, but by the time the twins and Renge had dragged her through three different wings, explaining sites of infamous pranks or reminiscing about middle school, she was too apathetic to so much as care about her glasses falling down her nose.

The building was beautiful, if not perplexing. Haruhi had to hand it to the twins - they knew their way around. Winding corridors, grand staircases in nonsensical places, an assortment of architectural styles that felt like a stroll through a history book; Haruhi felt as though she had fallen into some corner of Wonderland.

"And there are the stairs to the clock tower. It's supposed to be haunted, but don't tell Renge." Hikaru raised his voice on the last three words. Kaoru sniggered, but stopped when Renge held her fist up in his face.

"I'm not scared of it, I'm not!"

Haruhi furrowed her brow. "How many students are at Ouran?" The boys stopped goofing off and looked towards her.

"Gee, a couple hundred I guess." Hikaru shrugged. "We get new students all the time, and lose them almost as fast."

"Why?"

"Because parents are idiots," Kaoru said with a straight face, "and they don't know what's best for their kids." This did not answer Haruhi's question at all, but when she saw the same grave look on Hikaru's face she let the topic go.

"So, Haruhi," Hikaru began in an entirely different tone of voice. "Mind telling us what you and the Shadow King were talking about last night?"

"I don't think he wanted me to tell anyone about it." Haruhi tried to mask her awe as they passed by a hallway with beautiful white, arched ceilings.

"Ah." Hikaru smirked. "Little Miss Honest. Where's the rebel in you? You _know_ you want to talk about it." He slung one long arm over her thin shoulders. She narrowed her eyes at each of the twins in turn.

"No, I really don't. I'm sure he'll tell you both in due time."

Kaoru snorted. "I'm sure he _won't_. Kyouya-senpai hates us. I don't think he really likes _any_one, except the idiot Boss."

"That's not true!" Renge huffed. "Kyouya-senpai is a caring, understanding-"

"He's all about personal benefits," Hikaru interrupted.

"Yeah," said Kaoru. "He created the Host Club for two reasons - to make money, and collect all the most powerful students in the school for this army of his."

Haruhi frowned. "I thought you two didn't know about-"

"So it _is_ an army." Hikaru high-fived his brother. "Good guess, Kaoru."

Kaoru leaned against a column; they were in another wood-paneled hall, somewhere on the third floor. A plate on the wall read, _Third Year Dorms_. "The Shadow King is building an army," he said, seeming to try out the idea. "Against _what_, though? Did he mention that?"

Haruhi shrugged noncommittally. "I wouldn't tell you if he did. Listen, I'm gonna on back to my dorm. I'm getting a headache." When they turned to follow she snapped, "_Alone_."

She could hear their voices, laughing and joking, for a long ways down the hall. They finally died down when she rounded one wood paneled corner and came to a round room with stark white walls and a wrought-iron spiral staircase. She took one step into the room, her eyes roving the beautiful tiled floor, but froze when she heard voices coming from what seemed to be an alcove under the stairs. Recognizing them immediately, Haruhi sank back into the hallway until she could only see two pair of feet. The black boots were stationary, but the pair of sandals swung back and forth and side to side as their owner talked.

"I mean, I'm worried and all, but who isn't? Maybe this whole thing will just blow over and we'll all be fine." There was a pause. "Yeah, I really hope it all just blows over."

"Don't worry so much." It took Haruhi longer to recognize this voice; Reiko had never spoken more than a couple of words in front of her. She sounded low and gentle, like a mother. "What happens, happens. It's already set in stone."

"Do you really believe that?" Hunny sounded cynical. "That we can't do anything about it?"

"I don't know."

"Some great seer _you_'_ve _turned out to be." He chuckled. Haruhi could tell from his tone that he was only joking. "The visions," Hunny went on, a little more serious. "They're getting more frequent, ne?"

"Mm-hmm."

"Show me one."

Haruhi raised one eyebrow: how could she _show_ him? She heard the rustle of paper - the sketchbook Reiko always carried with her. Maybe she had drawn the vision in it? She leaned a little closer, cupping a hand around her ear.

"Who's that?" Hunny asked.

Reiko cleared her throat. When she spoke, she sounded mournful. "Headmaster Suoh."

"That's strange, huh? What else do you have?"

"Nothing."

"Liar," he jested. "There's another drawing on the next page. Can't you show me?"

Reiko hesitated. "No, I can't."

"I'm pretty sure you _can_."

A long silence followed these words, broken only by the occasional intake of breath. Suddenly feeling very uncomfortable, Haruhi turned and crept away. She just barely heard Reiko's voice echo behind her:

"I saw... Y-you're going to fall in love with someone else."

"Don't be silly, Rei-chan!"

The twins and Renge did not return to class until after lunch. Haruhi sat alone in the back of the room and almost enjoyed the spotty teacher's near-accurate description of myosis. She took ridiculously meticulous notes in her typewriter handwriting, and came closer to actual fun than she had had in weeks.

The first thing Hikaru said to her after the final bell was, "Mind if we copy your notes?" Haruhi stepped on his foot and trudged out the door, listening with satisfaction as Hikaru howled and Kaoru dissolved into laughter.

The first year dorms were on the opposite side of the second floor from the classrooms. Haruhi didn't know why the builders couldn't have created a more direct route, but as it was the trip back to her room was more like a hike through unfamiliar wilderness. She passed stained glass windows in jewel tones, Renaissance busts tucked into dark corners, one entire hallway lined with paintings of Paris. Somewhere in the maze she must have taken a wrong turn, for the voices of students gradually faded away into a dull murmur. Haruhi paused, looking around grumpily at the glitzy decor. She knew she was still on the second floor - she hadn't gone up or down any stairs, and a glimpse out of a small window showed a rainy sky and a reasonably short drop into the grassy courtyard. Haruhi sighed and leaned against the wall, her book bag weighing heavily on her shoulder. She could hear the loud ticking of a clock, the creak of footsteps above her, and... someone talking.

Haruhi took a step backwards. The voice was most definitely coming from the hallway she had just passed, the one marked "Private Practice Rooms", and it was not speaking Japanese.

_"Ah, je ne le sais pas! Mon Dieu, je ne peux pas crois ce j'ai manqué le cours."_

Were there exchange students in reform school? Haruhi frowned and poked her head around the corner.

She was entirely unprepared to see Tamaki Suoh there, reclining on a long bench with a notebook perched on his knee. He was squinting at the paper and tapping the end of his pen against his lips.

"_La mitosie-" _Haruhi stepped backwards onto a creaky board, and Tamaki's head shot up. It took a split second for his eyes to lock onto the retreating girl, and then he broke into a wide grin.

"Haruhi!" He beamed at her. "How are you enjoying the school so far?" Now that she had heard him speak French, Haruhi noticed the hint of an accent in his voice. It had a musical, rolling quality to it, and he pronounced words with an old-fashioned elegance.

It was annoying.

"I guess it's alright," Haruhi answered, shrugging noncommittally.

Tamaki gave an understanding nod. "Not where you'd rather be, huh?" He put aside the notebook; Haruhi saw that it was full of French, not Japanese. Tamaki caught the girl's eyes on his schoolbook and said, "Biology notes. I missed class and am having to copy Kaoru's. His handwriting is horrible, you see? I'm having the hardest time translating it."

Haruhi was still looking, mesmerized, at the notes. "So Japanese isn't your first language?"

"Nope." Tamaki smiled. "I moved here from France when I was fourteen, just two years ago."

"And the headmaster-"

"Isn't married to my mother." He nodded. "She's French and he's Japanese."

Tamaki had few features to suggest that he had any Japanese heritage at all. He was very tall and simply _long_, with legs that seemed to go on for days, and his hair was the exact color of a Golden Retriever, only softer and neater. His face was freckled and tan, and his eyes were dark blue and lined with thick, pale lashes. He smelled like sandalwood.

Haruhi couldn't stand sandlewood.

"So tomorrow's Luau Day at the Host Club." Tamaki changed the subject. "I'll see you there?"

"Unfortunately," Haruhi muttered.

Tamaki smiled brightly. "I know it seems bleak at first," he said, "but the Hosts aren't all bad. They're just passionate."

"Passionate?"

"They aren't criminals. They're just good people in bad situations. You'll discover that on your own soon enough." Tamaki gave another dazzling smile. "If you'll excuse me, I need to return these notes to Kaoru before dinner. I'll see you then!"

Haruhi left feeling frustrated. When she finally made it back to her room she threw her books onto the bed, kicked her shoes off into a corner, and screamed into a pillow. After all, there were few feelings worse than meeting someone who seemed to be genuinely nice through and through.

* * *

_The French should translate to "Ah, I don't know that! My God, I can't believe I missed class_." _Four years of high school French, but I'm a little out of practice so that may be horribly wrong. Correct me if you see an error._


	6. Chapter 6

_In which Haruhi has her first day of Hosting, and we meet a strange foreign student with an even stranger pet cat. _

* * *

"So Haruhi, what kind of girls are you into?"

_Dear mother in Heaven, what have I done to deserve this?_

Haruhi forced a smile and looked into the girl's dark, heavily lined eyes. "Um, quiet ones I guess."

Kita's shoulders shook with laughter. "You won't find too many of them around here," she said, smiling, as she took a sip of her drink - a daiquiri, and not a virgin one. Haruhi felt sick to her stomach. What was wrong with the teachers here?

It was her very first Host Club party - in other words, ordinary business day - and she was already wishing she had leapt out of the fourth floor window instead of given in to Kyouya Ootori. Then she wouldn't be sitting here in a potted-tree jungle, choking on the lemon-lime haze and dodging the glances of girls such as Kita, who had blue hair and a stud in her nose, and Aimi, whose skin might have been darker than her bleached hair.

_Aimi_, Hikaru had said earlier_, is a shoplifter. She can do this cool teleportation thing, but with people and other objects_.

_And the tall one, Kita_, Kaoru had continued_, drinks vodka out of a water bottle. She can control rocks and stuff. _

Haruhi did not doubt any of this. She looked at the numerous mismatched rings on Aimi's fingers, and wondered if they were stolen.

"Tell us," Aimi said in her breathy, holier-than-thou voice, "have you ever had a serious girlfriend?" She had narrow, hazel eyes, which seemed to be judging every aspect of Haruhi's appearance, from her newly trimmed hair to frilly hem of the yellow sundress the twins had stuffed her into.

_I'm going to kill all of those boys_. "No, I haven't."

"What about a boyfriend?" Kita threw in, leaning across the table a little. "Or are you just totally inexperienced?" She said this with a dramatic flair, her face twisting into a wide grin.

Haruhi felt like she was suffocating; she pushed her chair back a little. "I've, uh, kind of had a boyfriend before..." she lied.

Aimi scoffed. "I can't believe they're paying _you_." Her rings clinked as she gestured to Haruhi.

"_I_ think she's cute," Kita said, reached out to tap Haruhi's cheek. "You can tell us - you're a virgin, aren't you?" She said this with the secretive excitement of a girl at a slumber party. Haruhi had the distinct feeling that she was being forced into a game of Truth or Dare.

"I, uh..." Words flitted past in her mind - how best to tell them and avoid getting teased relentlessly? But whatever nasty things these girls came up with could not have been worse than the rumors she faced in junior high, that her bisexual father had raised her drinking liquor through a bendy straw.

"You see," she said slowly, "I just haven't found the right person yet. I'm saving myself for someone I really care about."

Kita gasped, and a smile spread on her face. Even Aimi seemed pleased by this answer.

"That's precious!" Kita cooed. "You're so innocent, it's just adorable."

The next twenty minutes were filled with idle conversation, covering a myriad of topics about which Haruhi had no interest or opinion. Shoes, relationships, cell phones. Sex. Haruhi watched the clock impatiently. Ten more minutes, five more minutes...

"So," Kita asked after awhile, "which Host is your favorite?" She threw a glance at the boys. "Aimi's a Tamaki fan, but I'm totally into Mori. I like the strong silent type, you know?"

Haruhi scanned the crowd; it was not hard to pick out Mori, who towered at least a head over most of the clients. With steel gray eyes and a black leather jacket, he certainly looked the part of reform school student more so than the others.

"So what are his powers like?" Haruhi asked.

"Electricity." Kita waggled her fingers as if to demonstrate. "None of the Hosts have particularly dangerous powers, except for him. He could kill someone in a heartbeat." Her tone of voice was not unlike Renge's, but with a sort of morbid air.

"He's a thief," Aimi said loftily. "Stole a car when he was 15." She pursed her lips as if tasting something unpleasant.

"Oh, he's ten times cooler than Tamaki and you know it," Kita sneered, giving her friend a playful shove. She turned back to Haruhi. "He did steal a car, but there's more to the story. Doesn't he look too innocent for that?"

He didn't look innocent at all. "Uh, maybe." Haruhi watched as Mori poured a cup of tea for one of the girls at his table. The china looked ridiculously delicate in his large hands, as though it might shatter just from him touching it. But there was something in his face, something soft and unexpected. Something sad.

* * *

"You're a natural! I never would have thought." Hikaru slapped Haruhi on the back, his voice echoing loudly in the empty gallery. Kaoru threw his arm around the girl's shoulders.

"You had Kita and Aimi eating out of the palm of your hand," he said. "Just wait until we get the word out - you'll have clients lined up out the door."

Haruhi slipped out of his grasp. "Whoopee." She waved her hand in the air sarcastically. "Can I go now?"

Kyouya shook his head and scribbled something on his clipboard. "We don't have club again until next Wednesday, so we need to straighten up the room. Hikaru, Kaoru, will you take the plants back to the greenhouse? You might have to make two trips." The twins saluted. "Hunny, please take the remainder of the snacks back down to the kitchen - and _don't eat them_." The tiny blonde boy pouted a little, but did as he was told. "Mori-senpai, Haruhi, please take the tea sets back and organize them in the supply closet. Tamaki and I will straighten up the tables and chairs."

Haruhi looked over at the tall, dark-haired senior. He nodded silently and headed for the back door, which he opened to reveal a massive closet.

"Here are the boxes," he said in a deep, smooth voice. "Pack them up gently."

Haruhi spent the next ten minutes setting tea cups and saucers into foam packing, then setting the boxes on the closet floor. When she finished, Mori turned to her and said, "Now we put them on the shelves. There are labels." He pointed to a strip of tape that designated the shelf number and order.

Haruhi nodded and read the label on the box she was holding: 1-2. "First shelf, second box?" she asked. Mori nodded. "This is a nice system Kyouya-senpai came up with."

"Not Kyouya. Kaoru's idea." Short, incomplete sentences, like a caveman, but there was a tinge of admiration in Mori's voice that made Haruhi smile a little. There was something about this guy that she sort of... liked. Respected, rather.

"Fourth shelf, first box." Haruhi picked up the box, but the fourth shelf was too high to comfortably reach. She had a horrible image of dropping the tea set, and what consequences might follow. "Hey, can you give me a hand?" she started to say, but she had hardly made it past the first word when two strong arms lifted the box easily from her hands and set it gently on the top shelf. Mori looked down at her with his stony eyes. She could smell the leather of his jacket.

"Was that the last one?"

"Yeah," Haruhi breathed. "We're all done." She felt for a moment that she should give him a high-five or something, but Mori's stony face said otherwise. She gave him a brief, polite smile before reaching for the knob. But no sooner had her hand touched the metal than Mori stopped her with one word.

"Don't."

_What_? Haruhi turned to look at him, a cautious fear beginning to bubble in her stomach, but in the silence that followed, she heard two voices outside the door, echoing in the vast gallery.

"Oh," she said out loud. Mori did not want to interrupt. Either that, or...

He was eavesdropping?

"She's legitimate, I can sense it," Kyouya was saying. "She predicted the arrival of Haruhi Fujioka months ago, down to the manifestation of her powers. Reiko Kanazuki had always been correct in her predictions, and I see no reason to doubt her now of all times."

There was a brief silence, then Tamaki's voice: "She saw... my father? I just don't understand - she saw him in trouble, but he's never done anything wrong. He's _not_ doing anything wrong, he wouldn't. I'm sure of-"

"Tamaki, it does not matter what he is accused of or whether or not the allegations are true. You understand that the board has the power to replace him with no second opinions? You understand their intentions - being the son of the chair has given you that advantage. Surely you can understand the gravity of the situation, if no one else can."

"I don't know." Tamaki still sounded doubtful. "Yes, there have been stirrings in the board. Yes, my father's power is beginning to wane. But if anything were to go wrong he could fix it. He's in charge, isn't he?"

There was another silence, then the sound of papers shuffling. "Reiko drew these," Kyouya said. "I trust you've heard of automatic writing? She has a similar gift. Her visions are preceded by an aura not unlike that of epilepsy. She pulls out her sketchbook, and..."

"These are incredible. Miss Kanazuki is quite the artist."

"She is not fully conscious when she draws these. Her hand automatically draws the images that flash through her mind. As you can see, some of them are not clear at all while others are, well, you get the general idea."

Tamaki gasped audibly. "It's like a photograph. My father... in handcuffs? This can't be accur-"

"Why are you so adamant in the delusion that you understand the future?" Kyouya raised his voice. "You refuse to open your mind to the possibility that your father could be removed and replaced at any moment. His guilt or innocence does not matter at this point. Your grandmother made her wishes clear, did she not? He broke them, and even if it was not a legal crime he will face the consequences. And when he does, so will the school. Your grandmother will take over, and she will be ruthless. We can only be prepared when that time comes."

The third silence stretched longer. Finally, Haruhi heard the sound of strong, angry footsteps. The gallery door opened, then closed with a slam. She realized she had been holding her breath.

"Haruhi," Kyouya said, not even looking towards the door of the supply closet. "Do you understand now what grave danger the school is in? Do you understand now why we need your help so desperately?"

Haruhi pretended she had not heard him.

* * *

The campus almost was pretty at sunset. Looking out the windows of the second floor, Haruhi could see the orange light creeping over the mountains and through the trees, creating morse code patterns on the glossy lake. It reminded her of a camping trip she had once been on with her father. A rainstorm turned the campground to mud shortly after dinner, and they wound up sleeping in the car.

Haruhi smiled a little to herself, thinking of her father and of the safe, comfortable homework awaiting her in her dorm room. Plenty of math problems to keep her occupied.

She was almost to the first year hallway when a skinny brown cat rounded a corner and stopped right in front of her. It looked up at Haruhi, its long tail swishing and its round eyes focused on her face.

"Great," Haruhi muttered. _It's probably gonna follow me_. Whose cat was it anyway? She doubted that even a reform school would allow students to keep pets. Perhaps a stray had found its way inside?

"You found my cat? _Spasiba_!"

Or not.

The thickly accented voice belonged to perhaps the skinniest, most colorless boy Haruhi had ever seen. He had nearly translucent skin, or at least what Haruhi could see of it; he was wearing a large, black sweatshirt in spite of the late August heat. His face was thin and tired, with large, pale blue eyes, and the dark hair escaping the hood of his sweatshirt was in dire need of a trim. Still, he seemed genuinely pleased with Haruhi; the wide grin he flashed her looked awkward on his gaunt face.

"Thank you so very much, I had been missing him." When he spoke again, it became even more apparent that Japanese was not his first language, as thought the Russian accent did not already give it away.

Haruhi shrugged. "I, um, didn't really find him for you. The cat just kind of walked up to me, I had nothing to do with-"

"_Govori pazhaluista medennee_. Speak slower, please," the boy said, smiling confusedly. "I do not understand you when you speak so fast." He tucked a piece of black hair behind his ear and said, in a grand and officious voice, "_Menya_, er_, _my name is Nekozawa. Umehito Nekozawa. I will be a third year here beginning next week._ Kak vas zavut? _That is, what is your name?"

Haruhi furrowed her brow. Why transfer so soon before graduation? "My name is Haruhi Fujioka," she said more slowly. "I'm a first year."

Nekozawa smiled again, less timid after the introduction. He bent over and scooped up the cat, which he held against his chest like a child.

"This is my dearest friend, Beelzenef."

Haruhi's respect for the seemingly kind boy plummeted. "He's, um, a very nice cat."

Beelzenef meowed loudly.

"I was wondering," Nekozawa said, "if you would be so kind as to help me find the third year dorms?"

And that was how Haruhi wound up carrying Beelzenef - Nekozawa had his heavy suitcase - through the twists and turns of the sprawling third floor, wincing as claws dug into her forearm, and trying to remember where she had seen the sign just earlier that day.

"Here they are," Haruhi said at last, motioning with her elbow at the long hallway with the arched ceilings. Nekozawa said something in Russian, and in moments he was inserting a gold key into the knob of a door marked, _320. _It swung open, and Haruhi found herself looking into a room so black it might have been pumped full of ink. At first she thought there was no window at all, but once her eyes adjusted to the darkness she realized that the far wall was covered with a heavy black drape.

"Ah, it is just I asked." Nekozawa dropped his suitcase on the floor and took his cat from Haruhi's arms. When he saw the confusion on Haruhi's face he added, "I cannot be in bright sunlight, you see. It will make me sick. _Spasiba_, thank you again for your help! I hope we will see each other again soon?"

Haruhi left the third floor wondering vaguely if Umehito Nekozawa was a vampire.

It would not have surprised her.

* * *

_I will not take the time to translate the Russian here because all of it has the English translation in the same sentence. I do not claim absolute correctness on any of it - translation sites (which I would not trust in the first place) only give the words in the Russian alphabet. Nekozawa's Russian speech comes entirely from a phrase list on a dating website. It is limited because most of the phrases were things like "May I kiss you?" and "You are my one and only". I made Beelzenef a real cat because, well, the puppet just seemed a little too comical for his character in this story. I had a real hard time trying to decide between giving Nekozawa black or blonde hair; I finally decided on naturally black - he is not wearing a wig. _

_I know that some things are still left unexplained after this chapter - Mori's background, the situation with Tamaki's father - but by now you've probably figured out that I don't like to give everything away at once. It will all be explained in time. _


	7. Chapter 7

_Dear Best Friend - I'm sorry this chapter took so long, and I'm sorry that it sucks moose balls. Please don't send your attack spiders to eat me in my sleep. I promise I will do better next time, I just needed to get back in Host Club mode. And really, it's not entirely my fault that I became so obsessed with FMA for the past two months. Thank you kindly._

_My longest chapter to date, to make up for the extended absence._

_

* * *

_

"Okay Fujioka, it's your turn! Don't be shy, give it a good kick."

Haruhi squinted; she could hardly see the pitcher's mound, the sun was so bright. A trickle of sweat ran down her forehead, and she looked back at her teammates. Kaoru waved enthusiastically from his spot on third base; Renge was adjusting her ponytail on third.

_How is everyone here so good at sports? _Haruhi wiped her forehead and walked up to the plate. The pitcher, a stocky girl with braces, wound her arm and let the rubber ball go. It skittered across the ground, bounced up at Haruhi's feet, and-

"The point is to kick the ball, not yourself."

Still clutching the back of her shin, Haruhi turned to face Hikaru, who was on the sidelines waiting his turn. "What kind of ball is this? I feel like my ankle's broken!"

"Hey, it has to be sturdy to be kicked around by kids with our abilities." Hikaru smirked as he smacked on a piece of chewing gum. "Now make sure you concentrate all your energy on kicking the ball, or it won't work right."

"Who made you boss?" Haruhi shook out her arms and stepped back up to the plate just as the pitcher let the ball go for a second time. Haruhi closed her eyes, pictured the ball in her head, and let her foot swing. Tennis shoe collided with rubber, and there was a hollow noise as the ball was knocked high into the air.

"Run! Run to first base!"

Haruhi, who had been gaping at the empty air in front of her, did not have to be told twice. But as she shuffled across the grass towards the spot Kaoru had just vacated, she noticed something strange: no one was looking at her. No one was trying to get her out. Every single person in the class had their eyes trained about thirty feet above centerfield.

The kickball had come to a rolling stop, in mid air.

The resulting home run would have tied the game, but as Haruhi was rounding second her focus broke and the ball fell straight into the hands of a bored and stationary Reiko, who just held it up as if to say, What should I do with this?

"Fujioka, Kasanoda, you two take the outfield." The coach blew his whistle as the teams switched sides for the next inning. Haruhi looked around the field, trying to put a face with a name.

"Hey, did you know you have a bug in your hair?"

Haruhi turned to see a tall, red-haired boy walking behind her; he had a harsh face, with a sharp jaw and dark, shifty eyes, and he was looking skittishly at Haruhi's head. She raised her hand; her fingers brushed against something small and hard, and she picked a winged beetle out.

"Thanks." Haruhi gave a brief smile as the thing buzzed away. Kasanoda bowed his head slightly in response.

"You're, um, new here?"

Haruhi nodded. "I moved in last week."

There was a hollow thud as the kickball was launched up into the air. Haruhi stared up at it, her brow furrowing in bewilderment - it was covered in ice, glimmering in the early afternoon sun. The small, mousy girl up at bat smiled apologetically.

"I, uh, I've got it." Kasanoda stepped back, nearly tripping over his tennis sneakers, as the ball hurtled towards him. Closing his eyes tightly, he raised his arms above his head, as if hoping the ball would just land there neatly with no effort - he was quite clearly not an athlete.

The ball did land in his hands, but it promptly bounced back out. In the moment that it touched his fingers, however, something very strange happened - the ball was enveloped in a strange, orange glow, and at once the ice vanished, dissolving into hissing steam. The ball landed on the grass with a resounding smack, and came to a stop at Haruhi's feet.

"C'mon, throw it this way!"

"Don't touch it!"

Kasanoda and the pitcher yelled at the same time, but Haruhi did not hear either of them. She had already reached out to grab the white ball, and a small cry of pain escaped her lips. The rubber surface was like a stove, and immediately the skin across her fingers turned red and began to blister.

"Oh God," Kasanoda was saying quickly, "I'm so sorry, I didn't mean for that to happen-"

"It's alright." Haruhi winced, trying not to look at her hand. "I know, you couldn't help it. I'll be fine." She forced a smile and grit her teeth.

_I hate these people._

_

* * *

_

The rest of the day passed horribly, and by the time Haruhi trudged into the fourth floor gallery her hand was throbbing and she had the beginnings of a migraine. She was prepared to pummel any of the boys who decided to nag her that afternoon.

But oddly, none of them did.

They were all sitting around one of the room's many tables, each holding a sheet of paper in their hands.

"Oh, this is gold." Kaoru jabbed a finger at the paper in his hands. "'Dear sons, your father and I regret that we will not be able to come to Visiting Weekend at your school, but we have previous engagements in Germany...' I love how she said 'sons' instead of just writing our names."

"At least yours is handwritten." Kyouya smirked as he held up a paper full of twelve point typewriter font.

Haruhi dropped her bag next to the sofa. "What are these?"

"Excuses," Kyouya answered. "Visiting Weekend is coming up, and our parents want to make sure they have their alibis planned in advance."

"My mom said she actually wants to come," Hunny said brightly, "but she probably won't. My dad won't let her. Shame." He flipped over his mother's letter, uncapped a bright green pen, and wrote _Kiss my ass, love Mitsukuni_ in large, cheery letters. He went on to draw numerous hearts and flowers around the words before turning to Kyouya and saying, "Where are the envelopes?"

Neither Tamaki nor Mori had said anything; Mori was staring at his letter in unreadable silence, but Tamaki's hands were empty.

"Haruhi," Tamaki asked eagerly, "are your parents coming to visit?"

Haruhi shook her head. "No. My mother is dead, and my father is working."

She could tell immediately that it was the wrong way to word it. There was an uncomfortable silence, then Tamaki's face flushed bright red. "Oh. I... I'm so sorry, I didn't-"

"Don't bother," Haruhi cut in. "It's no big deal. Now - what can I help out with?" She realized her tone was positive to the point of sarcastic, but the boys just shrugged and asked no further questions.

All of the boys, except for Tamaki - his dark blue eyes remained locked on her.

"Haruhi." Kyouya folded up his letter, running his fingers down the pin straight edges. "I see you've managed to injured yourself." For his condescending tone, he may as well have been accusing her of something childish and immature.

"Haru-chan!" Hunny's pale eyebrows shot up as he leaned over to look at her hand; Haruhi cringed at the smell of caramel. "What happened?"

Hikaru tipped backwards dangerously in his chair. "Ritsu Kasanoda happened, that's what."

Tamaki gasped, his hands flying to his chin. "Did Haruhi... offend him?"

"Nothing like that," Haruhi answered, shaking her head. "We were playing kickball, and, well..." She motioned vaguely to her bandage-wrapped hand. "He seemed like a nice enough guy."

Kyouya raised one eyebrow. "He did that to your hand without even touching you directly?"

"Wh-what? How did you know-"

"I have been observing his abilities for some time now," Kyouya interrupted, "and I feel that it would be in our best interests to befriend him. This little incident has proved my theories." He pushed up his glasses by the bridge and smiled amicably.

Haruhi felt something snap inside of her. "Who are you to tell me who I should be friends with? I'm sick of how shady and vague you always are! If you want me to do as you say, you could at least bother to explain what's so damned important-"

He silenced her with one simple glance. "I was under the impression that we were paying you. If I remember correctly, you are benefitting from this as well."

"Yeah, you're paying me, but it's hardly enough for two months of groceries." Haruhi crossed her arms childishly.

"I'll double your pay then." Kyouya looked up at her calmly from his seat. "I'll double your pay if you'll agree to help recruit whomever we need you too."

Haruhi was momentarily stunned. Double? It would still be a fortune to her father, but was it worth putting up with these guys every weekday afternoon?

Kyouya did not give her a chance to answer. "I'll let you think it over while you go set up all the chairs," he said pleasantly, pushing his glasses up his nose. Haruhi could have sworn he had devil horns beneath that soft, straight hair.

* * *

For the next few days, all anyone could talk about was Visiting Weekend. After the examples Haruhi had seen in the Host Club, she was surprised to find out that a majority of the students were actually expecting their parents to come. Even more shocking, most of those students seemed genuinely excited about seeing their family.

"My mother is flying all the way from Spain to visit me next week," a girl in Haruhi's class kept saying to anyone who would listen. "All that way, just to see me!"

"Mine's coming from America, that's almost as far," another boy would argue.

Haruhi turned to Renge. "There sure are a lot of students with parents in other countries."

"Yep." Renge tossed a braid over her shoulder and continued to doodle in the margin of her notebook. "You'd be surprised how many students here are the products of foreign mistresses. The numbers are astounding."

"Just like Boss," Hikaru added, tipping back in his chair.

"My parents are married," Renge explained, "but my mother is French, just like Tamaki-senpai's." She fingered the frayed ends of her braid. "I got my mother's light hair, but my father's body." Haruhi did not doubt this; Renge was about as full-figured as Astro Boy.

"And Hunny-senpai," Kaoru said ("The little bastard," his brother added), "is half-German.

"What about you two?" Haruhi turned to the twins. "Are your parents both Japanese?"

"Nope." Kaoru gave a Cheshire Cat grin. "We're half-Irish on our father's side."

"Our mother is a famous fashion designer," Hikaru went on casually, "so Dad took her name instead of the other way around."

Haruhi blinked once, then twice. "Your mother..."

Hikaru threw an arm over the back of his twin's seat. "Our mother is world-famous. She's in Berlin right now doing a fashion show."

"Her designs have made millions," Kaoru said, "but she travelled a lot while we were growing up. Giant mansion, private airstrip, no attention."

Hikaru stuck out his lower lip. "We suffer tragically from Poor Little Rich Boy Syndrome."

"It's why we're so disturbed," Kaoru added.

Haruhi had to bite her lip to keep from snorting. _Who are these people, and why am I stuck here with them?_ "Um, that must have been awful."

"No kidding," Renge said, biting sarcasm in her voice. "Having a private jet must have been horrible."

Kaoru shoved her gently. "Do my math homework tonight and I'll promise to give you a ride in it one day." One eyebrow raised suggestively, causing Renge to flush bright red.

Haruhi zoned out of the conversation, and found herself scanning the rest of the classroom. After a few weeks she was starting to put faces with vague identities - Kaeda was the one with the Batgirl boots, and the guy with gauged ears had a name starting with "M". The boy eating candy beneath his desk was supposedly some kind of genius, and the girl who was fast asleep on her math notebook had telepathy. And there, in the far row by the window, was Ritsu Kasanoda.

Haruhi had not spoken with him since the volleyball game - if that could be considered speaking - but she had paid a little more attention to him in the hallways. He did not seem to have any close friends, and it always looked as though he was having an awful time. There was a cold, malevolent gleam in his narrow eyes, and Haruhi felt intimidated just watching him from afar.

Which was no explanation for why she suddenly stood up from her seat and marched across the room to join him. The twins raised their voices in protest, but something was drawing her towards the solitary boy. Something like duty, a force she could not explain.

Kasanoda looked just as startled as Hikaru and Kaoru. His face turned into an almost comical mix of confusion and horror as Haruhi took the seat next to him, and when she opened her mouth to speak he quickly interrupted.

"I'm so sorry about your hand, Fujioka," he barked. "I hope it isn't hurting you anymore?" Then, startled by his own outburst, Kasanoda blushed.

Haruhi couldn't help but find his expression both pitiful and amusing. "No, no, I just wanted to tell you that it's feeling much better. Don't worry about it." _Since when am I the benevolent one? _"And I was wondering if you'd like to come eat lunch with us today?"

Kasanoda looked shell shocked for one long moment. His cheeks, already the color of his fiery hair, flushed even brighter. "W-with the Host Club? What's this about?"

Haruhi shrugged. "I, um, uh... no real reason. Just, you know..." _Damn, I'm a horrible liar_.

This answer seemed satisfying enough. "If it would serve as repayment for your injury," Kasanoda hastened, "then I would be happy to join you for lunch, Fujioka."

* * *

Which was how, at half past noon, Haruhi found herself squashed between Renge and Reiko, listening as poor Kasanoda stuttered beneath Tamaki's enthusiasm and Kyouya's cool, unnerving smile. No one else seemed to be paying much attention to the table's new addition - the twins seemed to be making a game out of withstanding hot sauce, while Renge and Hunny cheered them on - but Haruhi was uncomfortably aware of the flush spreading across Ritsu Kasanoda's cheeks.

Kyouya had wasted no time in drilling Kasanoda about his powers (surface temperature manipulation), his physical fitness (moderate), and familiarity with the school's higher-ups (zero), until Kasanoda looked like he wanted to sink through the floor. Occasionally he would shoot Haruhi a look of distress, as if to say, _Why did you bring me here? _

And Haruhi had no idea.

Her perspective had changed so subtly since her arrival, that Haruhi barely noticed. It was almost funny to think back about her first meeting with the Host Club, when Kyouya had first told her the very things that he was telling Kasanoda. What Haruhi didn't understand, was why she had gone along with it all for so long. His words had raised a small amount of panic and adrenaline at first, thinking that perhaps preparedness was worth its cost no matter what. Yet here, a month later, nothing had stirred. Not a hair was out of place. And Haruhi still waited, put up with their antics day after day, as though she...

"Fire? She saw _fire_? What the hell are we talking about here - a battle or something?"

... as though she belonged in this crazy, obnoxious family.

"Hey, Haruhi." Hikaru's voice was muffled as usual by a mouthful of bread. "Are you gonna finish that?" He jabbed one finger unceremoniously at the rice leftover in her bowl.

"You know," Renge scoffed, "the roll is still going to be there when you finish talking." Hikaru raised his middle finger at her.

"Here," Haruhi said, ignoring them. "It's all yours." She pushed the bowl to the center of the table, and Hikaru took it with the eagerness of a starving man.

"And yet you wouldn't give me your eclair when I asked politely?" Hunny pouted dramatically. He had a massive slice of chocolate cake in front of him, at odds with how tiny his wrists looked inside his jacket.

"Because you'd already had _three_."

"Haruhi," Hikaru said again, this time with rice in his mouth. "You're going with me to the dance next Friday, alright? I won't take no for an answer."

Haruhi opened her mouth to speak, but was interrupted by a repulsed gasp from her left.

"As the President of the club," Tamaki cut in, his blue eyes intense, "I think it should be my official duty to take Haruhi to the Fall Dance." The determination on his face was almost comical.

"You don't even do anything as President," Hikaru protested. "That's an empty argument!"

"Yeah, right, go ahead and count the rest of us out." Hunny crossed his arms over his tiny chest, looking peeved. "What if she doesn't want to-"

"Like she'd say yes to the charity case."

"Take it back!"

"Make me!"

Haruhi groaned, and threw a quick glance in Kyouya's direction. The boy pushed up his glasses and cleared his throat; the table instantly fell silent.

"Haruhi will not be going to the Autumn Ball with a date," he announced coolly. "Have you forgotten the entire reasoning behind her position in the Host Club?"

When Hikaru still looked confused, Renge kicked him under the table and said, "She's supposed to be a lesbian, dimwit."

_And thank the Lord for that_ Haruhi watched the boys with a certain level of trepidation. Tamaki was blushing; Hikaru and Hunny were still eyeing each other with contempt.

"What's the Autumn Ball?" she asked, mainly for the sake of filling the silence. Her innocent question was met with looks of shock.

"Only the biggest event of the second semester." Hikaru's voice was snarky and sarcastic.

Renge's fist was clenched tightly around her soda glass, and there was a dreamy look in her brown eyes. "A live orchestra, floor-length gowns-"

"Spiked punch," Kaoru threw in.

Haruhi raised one eyebrow. " 'Floor-length gowns'? Count me out." She hadn't worn a dress since her mother's funeral, and didn't plan on it ever again.

Kyouya's glasses flashed. "Not so fast. Club attendance is required, Haruhi. You'll have to be available to customers for the entire event. It's part of our promotion."

"You mean I have to act like a lesbian for the whole night?"

"Precisely." What could only be described as an evil grin spread across Kyouya's face. "How does one thousand more yen sound to you?"

She couldn't argue with that. Feeling slightly more depressed, Haruhi shrugged and began to collect her bags. The bell was due to chime any moment, and she wasn't wasting any time in getting to the solitude of the library for her study hour.

But oddly, she found that she didn't mind when Kasanoda hurried to follow her. He looked harassed and confused.

"What is with those guys? Are they serious?"

Haruhi nodded. "If you mean about the whole mutant army thing, then yeah. Unfortunately."

"And you're going along with it?" He sounded almost disappointed.

"Well..." Haruhi had no idea how to answer him. Of _course_ she was going along with it. They were paying her, for one thing, but it would be lying to say that she resented it. Hanging out with the Host Club was exhausting and frustrating, but somehow she found herself minding it less and less. It was almost impossible to explain.

"I have no reason to believe that Reiko is making this all up," Haruhi went on. "You've seen her drawings; they're incredible. But once you get to know the guys, they aren't all that bad. They're just passionate."

It wasn't until much later that she realized just where those words had come from.

Kasanoda shrugged. "I guess I was just surprised. I mean, I'd always just thought they were a bunch of rich idiots. Who would have guessed they had a cause?"

Haruhi found herself smiling. "Definitely not me."

* * *

_Yeah, the first scene was inspired by the dodgeball episode of Gakuen Alice._

_I took major liberties with nationality, but honestly: why does Hunny have blonde hair? It makes no sense. Same with the twins. So I used my artistic license right there. Besides, this is AU. _

_In the next installment: Visiting Weekend and the Autumn Ball, and a dark turn of events._


	8. Chapter 8

_I'm sorry this chapter took so long, but school has been crazy. College and fanfiction don't mix very well. Unfortunately for you guys, my grades take priority._

_I feel like this would be an appropriate time to blow your minds and tell you that this story is set in 1999. Want to know why? Ask me again in a few chapters and I will tell you. It has to do with something that happens later, and I don't want to spoil it. Sorry if this confuses any of you. But it does explain why Mori is wearing a leather jacket, in case that seemed tacky._

_6,881 words. The longest chapter I have ever posted for any story. Enjoy. _

* * *

"Here, try on this dress! It might be a little long on you, but the yellow would look lovely with your hair!"

_Someone shoot me_.

"Kaoru, what do you think about the shoes? Gold or silver?"

_This has to constitute torture_.

"Go with the silver ones. They would look nice with the periwinkle dress."

Renge shook her head. "There's a rip in that dress. It's not that noticeable, but if it stretches over her hips it could start to pull more."

"Are you kidding?" Hikaru snorted. "What hips?"

Haruhi felt her face grow hot, but she didn't say anything. For the past hour she had been on auto-pilot, letting the twins and Renge attack her with all manner of silk and lace. She tuned out their complaints about her hair (too brittle) and her shoulders (too bony) and her face (too round), with the only compliments regarding the fact that she was almost the exact same size as Renge, and could henceforth fit into the girl's entire wardrobe without a hitch. Right now she was standing in front of Renge's full-length bathroom mirror, zipped into a simple green knee-length dress. It looked like something a mother of four would wear out to dinner, but Haruhi was too tired of trying on clothes to protest.

"I like this one," she said, her voice monotone.

"You _do?" _It was no display of enthusiasm, but Renge was still thrilled. "Well then, it looks adorable! Kaoru, pass me the gold kitten heels."

Haruhi spun around a little. The dress didn't look _repulsive_, she determined. The green almost looked nice with her brown eyes.

Suddenly, there was a snapping noise, and Haruhi found herself looking at a reflection with straight, elbow-length hair.

"Hikaru..." She turned to face the boy, and the illusionary hair vanished with a _pop_.

"Sorry," Hikaru hastened. "I was just experimenting. You'd look nice with long hair, is all." A vague blush crept across his pointed nose, and Haruhi looked away, back at the mirror. Her hair had only been trimmed slightly since the beginning of school, and now brushed the top of her collar. It was more feminine than she would have liked, but she had received several compliments on it.

Maybe looking like a girl wasn't such a horrible thing.

Renge turned away from the armoire, a pair of sparkling heeled sandals clutched in her hands, and a look of absolute glee on her face. Haruhi changed her mind.

"Too bad Hosts aren't allowed to have dates," Renge prattled, "because you're going to look stunning."

Haruhi sneered. "I'm glad I don't have to find a date. Too much trouble."

"Speak for yourself," Hikaru huffed, crossing his arms over his chest. "Someone always asks me, and I always have to turn them down because of that stupid rule."

Haruhi wasn't sure whether to take his statement seriously, until Kaoru sniggered. "Unless by 'someone' you mean that girl who snuck into our room last year to give you a box of chocolates..."

Renge shoved him lightly, her little lips turned up in frustration. "Hey," she scolded, "Chitosi's nice. She's just a little, um..."

"Obsessive?"

"Clinically insane?"

Haruhi sighed and slipped her feet out of the gold heels. The bickering didn't look like it was going to end anytime soon, and it was almost eight. She had homework to do. With only an irritated grumble to announce her leave, Haruhi turned and twisted the door handle.

When the door opened suddenly, swinging in towards her by no motion of her own, Haruhi was so surprised that she involuntarily lifted several inches off the ground, causing the twins to burst into raucous laughter. Her sneaky escape was ruined, but as soon as she saw Kyouya's face she knew that it didn't matter. His black eyes were tense and frantic, and his lips were pressed into a thin white line. Behind him, Reiko was trying her best to blend into the wall. Her eyes looked bloodshot, as though she had been crying, and in her hands was her faded sketchbook.

"Emergency meeting in Tamaki's room," Kyouya snapped. His voice was controlled, but there was something dark beneath the surface. "_Immediately_."

* * *

Reiko held the sketchbook up for the second time, but still no one knew what to say.

In large letters, so neat and shaded they might have been newsprint, were two words; "Sixteen October." The sixteenth of October. The night of the Autumn Ball.

Just two days away.

"So this means..." Kasanoda's voice seemed to come from the wall itself, he was settled so far back into Tamaki's armchair, his body on edge as though he wasn't sure he belonged.

Kyouya straightened his glasses and gave Reiko a curt nod; her sketchbook rustled as she turned the page. "We need to be prepared," Kyouya said firmly. "We don't know what we're dealing with, but we know it's going to happen soon. And we know it's going to be bad." He motioned to Reiko, who held up what at first looked like a swarm of bugs. But on second glance, it was something even stranger: at least fifty 9's, of different sizes and proportions, all scribbled in a tight wad at the center of the page.

"Three _what_?" Hikaru screwed up his brow. "That doesn't make any sense."

Reiko gave Kyouya a distressed glance, and he translated: "No one knows. It could be referring to anything."

"A unit of time, maybe?" Hunny offered. He was sprawled across Tamaki's bed, trying to blow bubbles with a piece of nicotine gum. "Maybe it's saying that we'll have nine days, or nine weeks, once this bad thing happens."

"Or," Kaoru threw in from beside his brother on the window seat, "it could mean that there'll be nine ways out of the school, or something like that."

"Nine survivors..." Tamaki said, barely above a whisper. His mood had become outright morbid since the meeting had been called, with an understandable reason. It was his grandmother's fault that anything was happening at all. All of these bad things would be caused by her, and he felt unspeakably guilty in spite of his friends' assurances.

"Snap out of it, Boss." Hikaru frowned in Tamaki's direction. "Maybe it means something less urgent. Like, the nine of us will save the school or something."

"There are ten of us," Hunny threw in. "Bossa Nova-"

"My name is Kasanoda-"

"-makes ten."

Kyouya cleared his throat. "It doesn't really matter right now. The important thing is that we're ready come Saturday night. There's no telling what, if anything at all, awaits us. We can only guess from Reiko's drawings. But in the next two days, we need to form a plan. An escape plan, a battle plan, anything that will help us when the time comes. It is going to be executed calmly and deliberately, and we are _not_ going to lose." He pounded his fist on his knee for emphasis, which warranted some "Alright"'s and "We're behind you"'s from the guys (plus a "We're gonna kick some ass!" from Hikaru).

"Why don't we start with making a list of every known exit in the school?" Renge suggested. Her idea was met with a chorus of nods.

"There are some secret passageways that might be useful," Kaoru added. "Hikaru and I know where all of those are."

"If we need anymore help," Kasanoda offered, "I can ask a couple of my friends."

Haruhi watched her friends silently from her place by the door. She felt awkward and invisible, out of place with her satin dress and general ignorance about the school. She really was no help at all, she was finding. Why on earth had Kyouya asked her to join?

"Haruhi," Kyouya called. _Speak of the devil_. "Are you acquainted with Umehito Nekozawa? I understand you met him on the day of his arrival?"

Even after so many weeks at Ouran, Kyouya's powers were never not freaky.

"Um, we're not friends or anything, if that's what you're asking." Haruhi shifted uncomfortably beneath the boy's stony gaze.

"You will be," Kyouya told her simply. "We need him. You did a fine job bringing Kasanoda to us, and I believe he will be of some use. So does Reiko."

"You're welcome," Haruhi grumbled, accepting what was almost a thank you.

Kyouya scribbled something on his clipboard, then retreated to Tamaki's mahoghany desk. The twins, Hunny, and Renge were fervently discussing battle plans. Kasanoda watched awkwardly, while Mori looked on with general apathy. Only Tamaki was entirely disconnected from the action, sulking in one corner of the bed. With his back leaned against the headboard and his knees pulled up to his chest, he looked very much like a punished child. Haruhi made up her mind that one day, when she was braver and more useful, she would try to cheer him up.

* * *

It seemed cruel to Haruhi that Friday morning, the eve of their own D-Day, she pulled back her curtains and saw what most have been the most beautiful day in history. The sun came down in buttery strands through the trees, and a mist had rolled in over night from the lake. It looked like a painting from a refine art museum, and even cynical Haruhi had to appreciate it.

Until she was standing in front of her mirror two minutes later, a toothbrush in her mouth, and remembered what day it was.

By the time she got down to breakfast, families were already starting to arrive in droves. Small tables, draped in eyelet, were set up in the anteroom outside the dining hall. Aimi was sipping tea by the window, with an older man who was talking on his cell phone. Two tables over, Renge was chattering happily with two doting parents. And standing in a loose triangle in the corner was something Haruhi had not expected to see.

"No way. You are _not_ leaving him here with me!" Hunny clenched his fists and stared up indignantly at the woman Haruhi supposed was his mother. She was fragile and blonde, and looked as though a breath from an air conditioner might blow her off-balance.

"Mitsukuni," she said wearily, "be reasonable. Yasuchika just can't get the attention he needs at home, now that he's like you. This is the best place for him." She reached out and patted the back of a boy who, until now, Haruhi had not realized was part of the small family. He was standing with his back to his mother, looking nervously at the room's occupants, as though they might attack. At first Haruhi saw no resemblance; this boy was at least six inches taller than Hunny, with light brown hair, spidery limbs, and a pair of wire-framed glasses on his nose. But at a second glance, she saw the same round, rosy cheeks, and the same sheltered darkness in his hazel eyes.

"You act like it's some kind of disease," Hunny grumbled, regarding his brother with irritation. "Like this is a sanatorium."

"Mitsukuni..." His mother reached out and brushed his arm, feather-light, then recoiled. "You know I don't think that. If I had my way you would both be at home, like normal kids-"

"Well we're _not_ normal! You know what, maybe it would have been better if I _had_ died from leukemia. Then you'd have your perfect family!" And with that, Hunny turned on one heel and made a beeline for the exit. His mother did not try to stop him. She just took a stunned Yasuchika by the hand and settled into a table.

Haruhi tried to turn away, hesitant to be seen by the furious Hunny, but it was too late. He caught sight of Haruhi's flushed face, and his expression softened. He quickened his stride to meet her.

"I'm sorry you had to hear that," he apologized sincerely. "My mother's a bitch."

She had seemed alright to Haruhi, but she thought it would be best not to mention that. "It's alright," she said. "I understand. So that's your brother? How old is he?"

"Fourteen." Hunny grimaced. "He was the perfect child, until now. Managed to make all the water in the swimming pool freeze. He won't talk about it, but it's pretty clear what happened. He's a mutant, just like me. That's the only reason mom came - to drop him off." Haruhi wasn't sure, but she could almost sense a glimmer of pride in the boy's voice.

The dining hall was almost empty, they found. Except for the Host table, there were only a few other groups of students whose parents had not showed up. Renge was the only member of their circle who was eating with parents, and for the time being Nekozawa was occupying her chair, looking uncomfortable. His cat, Beelzenef, was mewing from his lap, trying to catch every bite of breakfast that slipped past.

The mood was somber. No one mentioned the previous night's meeting, but no one seemed inclined to bring up anything more lighthearted either. Even the twins ate their pepper-smothered eggs in relative silence.

Finally, Tamaki broke out of his morbid trance long enough to say, in an overly cheerful voice, "So, how are we going to spend our day?"

Kyouya looked at his as though he had heard a bad joke. "Have you forgotten all the preparations we have to do?"

Leaning back in his chair, Tamaki tucked his arms behind his head and grinned. "Yeah, well I figured that since we might not have that long left together, we should spend the day having some fun."

"Boss!" Hikaru slammed his glass onto the table with such force that Tamaki nearly toppled backwards. "Will you get over it already? None of this is your fault."

"It's my _family's _fault," Tamaki protested, "which means some of the blame is-"

"No, it's not. It's no one's fault but your grandmother's, because she's too thick-headed to realize that your dad is running a great place here. She thinks we're all monsters; you can't trust her judgement."

As his twin ranted, Kaoru got a strange, thoughtful look on his face. "Boss," he said when his brother was done, "you said we don't have that long left _together_. You... are you hung up on Reiko's vision? The one from months ago?"

Hunny, who had not said a word until now, looked up from his plate, his eyes wide. "The one where she said someone was gonna die?" He took Reiko's hand in his own as he spoke, causing a blush to spread across the girl's pale cheeks.

Kaoru watched Tamaki's face crumple, and the sight sparked a kind of action inside of him. "C'mon, we can't let ourselves sit around getting all upset about this. Tamaki, you're right. In case something does happen tomorrow or in the next nine days or whatever, we need to enjoy the time we have left. But we don't need to sit here and mope. We gave it a good run, guys."

Haruhi looked over at Kasanoda and Nekozawa, then down at her own lap. _Well, most of you_. _Some of us were just starting to call this place home_.

Kyouya cleared his throat. "Alright, that aside." The twins smiled in spite of the situation, and everyone turned their ears towards the Vice President. "As we discussed last night, we should start with making a list of all the entrances and exits to the school..."

* * *

They spent the afternoon on the lawn. The twins and Hunny had dragged Kasanoda into a competitive game of Freeze Tag, while the rest of the members sat the relative shade of a large gazebo. Kyouya was making notes in his black notebook, and the sun-sensitive Nekozawa was stroking his cat beneath the brim of an umbrella.

"Hey, senpai?" Haruhi looked over at Tamaki, who was perched in the chair next to Kyouya's, looking anxious enough to wet his pants. "Why aren't you playing Tag?"

The boy put on an enthusiastic smile. "Oh, well, the President should be here to make plans, right? I don't mind."

"You don't really think that you're helping, do you?" Kyouya did not miss a beat; his eyes remained locked on the paper.

Tamaki looked indignant. "I'm providing moral support! That's helpful!"

Laughing inwardly, Haruhi looked away and scanned the expansive lawn. The lake glimmered just beyond the thin barrier of evergreen trees. It was a deceptively normal sight.

"You totally moved! I saw you!"

Hunny's condemning voice carried like a gunshot across the lawn, and Haruhi turned to see the tiny boy pointing an accusing finger at Hikaru, who was very much frozen.

"What the hell?" Hikaru pouted. "I haven't moved a muscle! I am _so_ being It next time."

Kasanoda looked harried and harassed where he stood some twenty feet away from Hikaru and Hunny; he had apparently given up being frozen, and was now standing defeated with his hands in his pockets. Haruhi felt a little sorry for him; getting sucked into a game with those three could not have been fun.

"Kyouya-senpai," Haruhi said, her eye suddenly catching something through the trees, "what's that building on the other side of the lake? Is it part of the school?"

Once again, Kyouya did not look up from his notebook. "Our campus extends to the middle of the lake. On the other side is a small town. The building you see is an abandoned home."

"Oh." Haruhi tried to imagine it - civilization so close to this dreadful place. It seemed absurd. "Have you ever been there?"

"I haven't personally," Kyouya said in a very bored voice, "but why don't you ask Mori-senpai?"

Upon hearing his name, the tall boy looked up from his schoolbook, out of which he was silently working math problems. "Almost no one lives there." Mori motioned vaguely across the lake. "It's an old fishing village. There is a bait store, and a general store."

"And you've been there?" Haruhi asked. "Why?"

"Where do you think Mitsukuni gets his cigarettes?" Without waiting for a reaction, Mori lifted his pencil and went right back to his homework.

"Oh," Haruhi said to no one. "That must get expensive."

Mori threw an unreadable glance at Kyouya; the younger boy nodded, peered over his glasses, and said casually, "Mori-senpai has his methods."

But as Haruhi mulled over this riddle, Tamaki's face was growing redder and redder. "Every time you go over there I get nervous," he wailed. "What if you get arrested for shoplifting?"

"I'm already in reform school," Mori said simply.

"But next it could be jail! The sooner Hunny-senpai stops smoking, the better. I hate that you risk your life every week just for that stupid habit!" Tamaki was getting passionate; Haruhi half-expected his ears to leak smoke, but Mori silenced the boy with a stern glance, and the conversation was through.

_I still can't imagine him stealing a car_, Haruhi mused, her eyes fixed on Mori's handsome face. She had several ex-cons, in her father's liquor shop, and Mori looked nothing like them. His hair was neat and trimmed, and there were no weird stains on his leather jacket. But as desperately as she wanted to know the whole story, it seemed out of place to ask him, and downright sneaky to bring it up with any of the other boys. They all seemed to respect Mori a great deal, and Haruhi knew it had to do with the car. They treated him as if he was some kind of martyr for the "mutant cause". But until the day that they were ready to reveal it to her, Haruhi could only imagine what kinds of things Mori had gone through in his apparently troubled past.

* * *

"This is a map of the school, circa 1991, after the renovation of the fourth floor." Kaoru skimmed his closed pen across the thin, white paper. "See this portion of wall here? There's a staircase behind it, leading down to a tunnel that runs next to the basement."

"And where does the tunnel go?" Kyouya scratched his chin and squinted at the map.

"Right to the lake," Hikaru said proudly. "Kaoru and I went all the way through it when we were in middle school, and it was kind of a tight fight once you get to the end."

"We might have to limit its use to the younger kids, then." Nodding slowly, Kyouya ran his finger along the black line. "Anything else on the first floor?"

The twins exchanged a glance, and turned to the rest of the Club. They were once again huddled in Tamaki's dorm room, sans Renge and the two newest additions, mulling over a set of maps and blueprints that had come into Kyouya's hands through means which he had not revealed.

"There are two tunnels out of the school," Kaoru went on. "One is bigger, but it's harder to get to since it's in the main lobby, and it leads to the front drive. The tunnel to the lake would be our best bet if it wasn't so small."

Something flashed in Hikaru's eyes. "Don't forget the laundry chute," he said eagerly, and Kaoru smirked.

"I was getting to that." Brushing the page, feather-light, Kaoru pointed to a small square that indicated the laundry chute. "This right here used to be an elevator, but it was too small once they upgraded. There is a secret panel at the bottom of it, that opens right into the lakeside passage."

"And that is supposed to be useful to us _how_?" Hunny was in a rotten mood after the run-in with his mother, and did not seem close to recovering. "What, are we supposed to all just drop down the chute and escape?"

Hikaru opened his mouth, a vein above his eye pulsing, but Kyouya was first to answer. "I'm afraid we won't know its exact function until the occasion arises. As for now, we can only speculate that it will be of some use."

"We need a more concrete battle plan," Tamaki threw in, his face scrunched in deep thought. "So far it's just 'get out and hope for the best'. But what are we going to do once we get out? Run?"

For a moment, there was complete silence. In all honesty, no one had much considered this. Even Kyouya, with his analytical mind, had been working things from the top down. Clearing his throat, Kyouya adjusted his glasses, looked over at the window seat, and said, "I believe Reiko has already told us that."

Reiko looked startled for a moment. She fiddled with the ends of her sweater sleeves, and glanced skittishly around the room. Then, she reached for her sketchbook, slowly and hesitantly, and opened it to a page near the middle. "Fire," she said, quiet and simple. "There will be fire."

"Yeah, you told us that weeks ago," Hikaru retorted, his arms crossed in irritation. "And it still doesn't make any sense. I mean, if we don't know what will cause the fire then-"

Kyouya gasped, barely audible, but enough to make Hikaru jump. "We'll cause the fire," Kyouya said, something like passion filtering into his dark eyes. The coolest of smirks spread on his face. "Drive them out. Take it to the lawn."

"And then?" Tamaki's voice was quiet with hesitation.

"We fight. We fight to disarm, if not to kill." He locked eyes with Reiko, and she gave a curt nod, her head bowing in honest distress.

Haruhi had remained silent, having nothing to add to the conversation. But she couldn't help thinking the big question that was just behind everyone's lips: _Who will we be fighting? _With just a vision and a drawing to plan the future upon, things seemed very bleak and unlikely. But if Haruhi had learned anything about this school and about Reiko Kanazuki, it was that everything was terribly real.

* * *

The day leading up to the Autumn Ball felt like a dream to Haruhi. She could almost hear a clock ticking in her mind, knocking off the hours until they found out what unknown horrors awaited the school. Half the day was spent socializing and planning, which kept her mind busy, but for the other half Haruhi wandered around like a ghost, trying not to believe that a big change was just around the corner. But if she closed her eyes, she could almost feel it in the back of her throat, like a bad energy. It was too close for comfort.

The sun was just going down when Renge dragged Haruhi up to the dorm rooms to get ready. The green dress was already lying out on Renge's desk, along with the gold heels and an absurd amount of jewelry that Haruhi would never be caught dead in. Three bottles of identical perfume had been carefully selected.

To Haruhi, they all smelled like feet.

"I can get ready on my own, really," she insisted. But there was no escape; Renge currently had Haruhi's hair wrapped around a curling iron, and gold nail polish drying on her fingers and toes. It was the most like a girl that Haruhi had looked since she was a child.

"Don't be silly," Renge cooed. "You're going to look wonderful for everyone tonight, trust me. You will have guys - and girls - slapping their grandmothers just to dance with you."

As compelling of a visual as this was, it did nothing to inspire enthusiasm. Haruhi sank a little farther down in the chair.

"Stop being so difficult." Renge crossed her arms over her chest. "I can't get a good grip on your hair like this!"

"Maybe that's the point."

"I just want you to look nice tonight!"

"Why does it matter to _you_?"

Renge suddenly seemed very close to tears. Her voice was thick as she spoke: "Because there might not be another chance."

The silence was awkward at best. Renge continued to meticulously curl Haruhi's hair, while the grouchy beauty victim tried to imagine that she had won that argument. But the sincere sadness in Renge's face, tugged at something in her heart, and Haruhi finally said, "I'm sorry I snapped at you. I understand why you might be upset by this."

Renge frowned. "Like you're _not _upset?"

Shrugging, Haruhi answered, as detached as possible, "This place isn't really my home or anything. Not like everyone else. If things get bad, I just write home to my aunt and tell her I love it here. Then it's off to Switzerland or something for me."

"You really don't care what happens to us." It wasn't a question. Renge did not make eye contact with Haruhi, but her voice conveyed unspeakable grief.

"No," Haruhi was quick to answer, "that's not what I meant at all." But Renge had already whirled around, her mousy braids whipping her tear-stained cheeks as she vanished into the bathroom. The lock clicked behind her, but Haruhi could hear every stifled sob in chilling detail.

"Mother in Heaven, why can't I do this friend thing right?" Haruhi spoke to the night sky as she rose from the desk chair, sinking instead into the pillows of the window seat. She thought to go back to her room and finish preparations on her own, but leaving Renge alone seemed crueler than anything. Needing fresh air, she undid the latch on the window and swung the panels in. The night air was thick with the promise of rain, and she could have choked on the humidity.

This time, it did not come as a surprise when a cigarette butt dropped past her head and disappeared into the shrubbery.

"Your aim was a little off," she called up to Hunny. He gave her a bright smile and shrugged.

"You were distracting me," he answered, brushing pale hair out of his eyes. "It's not often I open my window for a smoke and see such a pretty face down there."

Haruhi wasn't sure whether to be flattered or offended; she went with neither, and ignored his comment altogether. "You all set for tonight?"

Hunny leaned a little farther out the window, and Haruhi saw that he was wearing a green tie and a white dress shirt. He looked like a child attending a wedding. "Yep. All dressed up. My pants are too long." He grimaced.

"That wasn't what I meant." Haruhi shook her head, and her new curls bounced. "Nevermind. I'll talk to you at the dance." There were windows separating them; others were bound to hear them perfectly. Hunny seemed to get this same idea, for a vague smile appeared on his lips.

"Yeah," he answered, something unspoken in the way he nodded his head. "I'll, um, see you in a little while." Then, his eyes lingering on hers a few seconds longer, the fragile little boy disappeared back into his room. The window swung shut with a clatter.

Haruhi stayed where she was, enjoying the cool air on her face, until the sobs coming from the bathrooms settled into a sporadic sniffling. After what must have been ten more minutes, the door creaked open and Renge emerged, looking like Death. Her eyes were swollen shut with tears, and her hair, beautifully crimped for the Ball, was a mess. Silently, she shuffled back to the mirror, motioned for Haruhi to join her, and picked the curling iron back up. There were no words, no communication, until Renge had finished almost twenty minutes later. Then, "Hand me the hairspray, please."

Haruhi did so, but paused before holding the can out. "I'm sorry," she muttered. "I didn't mean anything bad by what I said."

"I know." Renge sniffed. "I just can't stand the thought of losing everyone. Things are finally perfect."

The pure grief in her voice made Haruhi's heart beat faster. She had no idea what to say in this situation; comfort was not a talent of hers. So, she just patted Renge awkwardly on the hand and said, "It'll be alright. I mean, it was just a vision. We don't even know if anything _will_ happen tonight."

But Renge shook her head. "Reiko's visions never lie."

"You can't possibly know that."

"But we do. You're proof of that." Renge bent down, looking Haruhi firmly in the eye. "She said that you would come. A small, brunette girl with gravity powers, who would bring us together. And here you are." She fingered the stiff, shiny curls in Haruhi's hair, admiring her handiwork. Then, she gently pulled Haruhi into the first hug that the girl had received since she was taken from her weeping father.

* * *

"Well, the housekeeping staff have really outdone themselves. The decorations look nice." Glancing around to make sure he was not being watched, Hikaru reached out and pressed one finger to the ice statue. What a peacock had to do with autumn, no one was quite sure, but the artist was apparently a good friend of Tamaki's father, and had lent his artwork for free.

In fact, none of the rooms decorations really seemed relevant to the occasion. She had expected leaves and scarecrows, but the windows were framed with white gossamer curtains, and tiny rainbow lights were hanging from the ceiling like celebratory icicles. Even the attire seemed spotty - some girls were in floor-length gowns, others were in torn black lace and combat boots, and a few wore jeans and nice shirts. Almost half of the guys had come casual, though the Host Club looked polished as usual.

"This makes no sense." Haruhi took a sip of champagne, trying to ignore the taste, and motioned to the ballroom. "I thought this was supposed to be autumn-themed."

Kyouya straightened his tie and answered, "The Autumn Ball is not a celebration of the season, but a celebration of individuality and self-expression. It's for the same reason that the Institute has so few rules. Headmaster Suoh believes in letting children grow uninhibited by regulations."

"So I've noticed," Haruhi mumbled, thinking of the champagne in her hand.

"Haruhi!" Tamaki started to place a hand on the girl's shoulder as he approached her, but for some reason he stopped and recoiled. His eyes got wide, and he stammered, "Nice d-dress. Is it, um, Renge's?"

Haruhi frowned. She had hoped no one would look at the dress; it made her feel naked and fake to be wearing something so light and airy. "Yeah, she loaned it to me."

Tamaki started to say something else, but Kyouya interrupted: "Ah, Haruhi, Kita and Aimi just arrived. They're some of your best customers. It would be a good idea to go greet them."

Translation: _Go mingle with the lesbians, or you will never hear the end of it._

Groaning to herself, Haruhi gave Tamaki an apologetic smile, and headed off in the direction of the two older girls.

* * *

After an hour and a half of being twirled around, fawned over, and flirted with by her devoted customers (not to mention the Hitachiin twins), Haruhi had had more than enough of this ball. Her feet were killing her, even in the low heels, and the loud music had long since started to give her a headache. The word "ball" suggested light classical music, but instead they played a motley assortment of deafening rock, cheerful pop, and music in languages that Haruhi could not identify, for the school's foreign students. She was now hovering over the refreshment table, hoping that none of her customers would recognize her from behind.

Haruhi picked up a shortbread cookie from a glass plate, and subtly scanned the crowd of red-faced, jubilant party-goers around the table. All of her friends were dancing with partners, except for-

"Hey, Bossa Nova!" Haruhi flagged the boy down just as he made a beeline for the drink table. He was wearing a poorly-tied red tie, and he had made some kind of attempt to smooth his hair down. It looked as though he was trying to impress a potential employer.

"Oh, Haruhi..." He scratched the back of his head as the girl approached. "Are you, um, having a good evening?"

Haruhi grimaced. "My legs are _killing_ me."

Kasanoda blushed. "Then I'm guessing you want to sit down, rather than, erm, dance... or something?"

"Yeah, sitting down sounds great right now." Haruhi, oblivious to the disappointment on her friend's face, led the way to some high-back chairs near the picture windows. She kicked off her heels, letting them drop with a clatter to the parquet. "Want half of the cookie?"

Kasanoda declined, and quietly took the seat next to Haruhi. "So. What do you think's gonna happen tonight?"

"Honestly?" Haruhi was getting tired of talking about this. "Nothing. I mean, I trust Reiko, but..."

"It does sound far-fetched." Kasanoda looked down at his gloved hands. "Well, no more far-fetched than a school full of delinquents with superpowers." Haruhi laughed, and Kasanoda managed a weak smile. "I'm glad I met you, Haruhi. I mean, if you don't mind me saying-"

"Haruhi! Haruhi!"

There was no mistaking Hikaru Hitachiin's voice as he drifted over from the mass of dancing teenagers, an empty glass of champagne in hand and a goofy grin on his face. "Haruhi," he repeated, "I need to talk to you. Will you come out in the hallway?" One thumb jabbed towards the ballroom's double doors.

Sighing, Haruhi muttered an apology to a shocked Kasanoda and, still carrying her plate, followed Hikaru through the throng of students. The boy looked strange, almost on edge, and as soon as they reached the end of the room and pushed open the heavy doors, all color drained from his face.

"I, um, have been meaning to, uh, talk to you, Haruhi." Hikaru closed the door behind them, and the sound of the dance was abruptly cut off. "Want to, um, sit down."

Haruhi eyed him nervously, suddenly wishing that she had stayed inside with Kasanoda. "I'm alright." Her voice echoed strangely in the wide, dimly lit hall. She imagined it reaching all the way to the foyer.

"Good. Well, the thing is," Hikaru went on, scratching the back of his head, "I just wanted to ask you if maybe, I mean, I know there are a lot of other guys at this school, and I'm not asking you to say right now what you think, but-"

"You're making no sense." Haruhi frowned, trying to act oblivious, but inside she knew exactly where his babbling was going. She knew where it was going, and it scared her. _Please please please let him be talking about something else_.

"Oh. Right." Closing his eyes and taking in a deep breath, Hikaru started, "Haruhi, I just wanted to tell you that I really l-"

He never got to finish. Suddenly, there was a resounding crash from down the hall, in the direction of the foyer, followed by an inaudible shout. A door slammed, and shoes scuffled across a tile floor, but over the clamor a voice was clear as moonlight.

"You can't take me away! They _need _me, don't you see that?" The man's voice ricocheted in the cold, tiled hall, and Hikaru's eyes widened.

"It's the headmaster," he whispered hoarsely. His hand wrapped around Haruhi's and he tugged the startled girl in the direction of the voices. "It's Tamaki's father."

"You mean..." Haruhi felt her face grow ghost white. "Oh my God. Should we go tell the others?" she breathed, but Hikaru just looked back and pressed a finger over his lips. As he did so, the voice came again.

"They're just kids! I know how your brain works, Mother, you think that people like them, like Anne Sophie, are animals!" There was fear and anguish in the headmaster's voice, but there was also rage.

A new voice answered, this one of an old woman. "Silence. It has all been decided, the moment that you chose to talk to your despicable, mutant wife behind my back. You sealed this school's fate."

Hikaru and Haruhi had almost reached the foyer by now, the voices growing louder with every step. Finally, they edged around a corner and came in full view of the scene. What Haruhi saw made her feel sick to her stomach.

Headmaster Suoh was flanked by two large men in black military garb. His thin wrists were locked into handcuffs.

_Just like Reiko's drawing_.

Tamaki's grandmother bore shocking resemblance to Aunt Etsuko, only she was smaller and had a stern, strong face. Her grey hair was pulled back into a strict bun, and her traditional Japanese kimono made her look like the villain from a period manga. Just one look at the woman sent shivers down Haruhi's spine. She found herself gripping Hikaru's hand more tightly, as her heart pounded out warnings in her head.

_This is bad. This is very bad. _

"Leave." The old woman drew out one finger and pointed at the front door. There was no emotion on her face, only icy detachment. "Do not show your face in my school. From this moment forth, you are never to contact your son again."

The headmaster looked on the verge of tears, but his back was straight and his face level as he said, "You underestimate the power that those children hold, Mother. That will be your undoing." And with those final words, he took a last, sweeping glance at the foyer, and allowed the burly men on either side to escort him out into the inky night. The door swung closed with a final _bam_, and there was a dense silence. Haruhi felt sure that the old woman could have heard the beats of two frightened hearts in the corridor.

"Let the criminals finish their ball," the woman said after a moment, turning to the ring of black-clad staff that shadowed her. "In the morning, everything will change." And on that chilling note, she vanished into the office door.

Haruhi and Hikaru did not know how long they remained in the hallway, clutching each other's hands like lifelines, but by the time they turned back, pale and shaking, the ball had ended and oblivious students were beginning to make their way back to their dorms. No one else knew what had happened. No one else knew that their world was about to be shaken, maybe even destroyed.

Silently, wordlessly, the two opened the ballroom doors and went to find Kyouya.

It had begun.

* * *

_I know, you want to know the story behind Mori and the car, and I was really planning on including it in this chapter. But it just didn't fit. I didn't feel like he would tell it in front of so many people, so I took it out._

_I know a bunch of the end of that chapter seemed kind of melodramatic, but it's 2:30 in the morning. Everything is more dramatic at 2:30 in the morning. _


	9. Chapter 9

_Oh goodness. This chapter. THIS CHAPTER. I just could not write it, no matter how I tried. This must be Version 4.0 or something. It's a difficult time in the story though - a big transition. I was having trouble writing it without being too expositional, but finally I realized that some narrative was necessary. It's not my best work, but it's not my worst. And working on it any further was just going to screw it up more. So here's Chapter Nine, in which shit gets real._

_

* * *

_

Haruhi did not sleep that night. For hours she lay awake, trying to imagine that things were different, but the same ceiling fan creaked above her; the same soft sheets tangled around her legs as she tossed and turned. Around four, she finally surrendered and turned on the bedside lamp. Even with the familiarities of the room, something just didn't feel right. The building was breathing differently. She could swear that she heard it moan, deep inside the foundation.

The sun still rose - that was a good sign. Trying to push the worry out of her head, Haruhi changed into her corduroys, an old sweatshirt of her father's (from his masculine days), and a pair of brown loafers. She dug her glasses out of her book satchel, and didn't bother with her hair. Somehow, it was like comfort food. The sweatshirt made her feel as though her father was right there with her.

Just as she was brushing her teeth, there was a sudden static noise, loud and abrupt, and the PA system crackled into life. She had only heard it used two or three times, and for a brief moment she took the unfamiliar noise to be fireworks outside.

_"Attention all students,"_ a deep male voice said._ "You will report immediately to the back lawn. Any student not present in ten minutes will be punished. You will not bring anything with you, and complete silence is expected." _There was another static crackle as the speaker signed off, and the room was once again silent.

Haruhi did not notice that she had dripped toothpaste on the counter. She stood in front of the mirror, stunned.

There was no going back now, no pretending that nothing was wrong. Knots forming in her stomach, she rinsed out her mouth, grabbed a jacket, and left her room.

Renge was already in the hall, looking fidgety and pale. When she caught sight of Haruhi, her eyes went wide. "What's going on? Why are we going outside?"

"Do I look psychic?" Haruhi heard herself say, but her heart was not in the words. "Ask Kyouya."

Renge did not say anything more. Bowing her head, she silently followed Haruhi down the hall. Doors passed as they opened them, and sleepy students meandered into the hall, even more confused by the announcement than Haruhi and Renge; no one outside of the Club knew about the headmaster as of now.

"Did someone get in trouble?" a small girl asked.

Another one replied: "Probably a vandal or something."

"Haruhi! Over here!" Tamaki, dressed in red pajama bottoms and a brown winter coat, waved from where he was standing at the top of the grand staircase. He began to push through the crowd, until the three of them met in the middle. "Have you seen anyone else?"

Haruhi gestured to Renge. "No, but we might have missed them."

"The twins had a _lot_ of champagne last night," Renge said, her lip curled up in disgust. "They probably slept through the announcement."

Tamaki nodded curtly. "I'll go check on them. You two go ahead downstairs." With a last smile, he began to weave his way through the drowsy students, back towards the Hitachiins' room.

"C'mon." Haruhi tugged at Renge's hand, and the two continued down the stairs, dreading whatever waited on the back lawn.

* * *

The campus was covered in fog, and the lawn looked like something from a dream. Thirty or so students were already lined up in the dewey grass, shivering in pajamas. Several burly men in black military clothing were standing in front of them, like wardens in a jail. A bird cawed overhead; Haruhi felt a deep shiver go down her spine.

It only took a moment to pick some familiar faces out of the line. Kyouya, Mori, and Hunny all stood in a row near one end; Kyouya and Mori had managed to get dressed before coming outside, but Hunny looked positively miserable in thin pajamas. Haruhi took the empty space beside him, and he didn't say a word.

"Is Tamaki on his way?" There was a hint of concern in Kyouya's voice, and they all understood: more than anyone, Tamaki could not be caught breaking any rules.

Haruhi told him about the twins, but another question was nagging at the front of her mind. "Kyouya-senpai, Tamaki's grandmother mentioned someone named Anne Sophie. It's probably none of my business, but-"

"Tamaki's mother."

"What?" Haruhi was caught off guard by his sudden answer.

Kyouya ran one hand through his uncombed hair. "Anne Sophie is Tamaki's mother. She's who he got his powers from."

"And she ordered Tamaki's father to cut off contact with her?"

"Correct." Kyouya nodded briskly.

Haruhi hummed in understanding. "That's rough."

It was a few more minute before Tamaki and the twins, joined by Kasanoda, showed up, some of the last students out of the building. They squeezed in between Kyouya and Mori, and Kasanoda stepped in meekly on Kyouya's other side. Timid "good morning"'s were passed between the group, before the sound of a whistle startled them into silence.

One hundred and fifty students were lined up in the cold October morning, but the large, coffee-skinned man did not look at a single one of them as he spoke. His voice, even bigger than his body, carried across the lawn as if by magic.

"As you have surely noticed by now, a change of command has taken place in this institution. My name is General Zev. I work under Headmistress Suoh. Your previous headmaster was found to be unfit to further run this school, and has been dismissed. ."

A murmur of whispers went through the student body, but when one of the men handled what appeared to be a small gun at his waist, everyone went silent again.

"There will be some drastic changes in your way of life now that the Headmistress is in charge," Zev continued, his voice level and cold. "Attendance by mutant children has been made mandatory, and to make room for the new students you will be put with a roommate. Boys, take a step forward."

There was a rustle of fabric and breath as roughly seventy-five boys shuffled forward. Haruhi looked over at her friends, who were all straight-backed and wide-eyed. Beside her, Hunny looked vaguely like he was going to be sick.

It was only after several seconds of uncomfortable silence that Haruhi realized something: Tamaki's grandmother was looking straight at her, as were the black-garbed guards and school faculty.

"_All_ the boys, step_ forward_," the General repeated. Haruhi looked left and right, trying to see someone who might have been out of line, but everyone seemed to be obeying the order without question.

She did not see the soldier until he was upon her, breathing heat into her face and twisting her arm until it burned.

"Get in line, boy. Do as you're told!" His gun pressed up against her hip, and Haruhi gulped down a yelp of pain. She saw white on the insides of her eyelids. _Surely_ he had broken her arm...

But suddenly, Haruhi understood. She understood perfectly.

"I-I'm not..." she stuttered, but no one was listening. The man released her, shoving her into an older boy's side, and returned to the General's side. Before Haruhi could get a word in Zev began to speak.

"Starting at the right end, _every other student_ turn to your left," the man barked. Haruhi imagined her voice coming from a jackal. "The person you see is your new roommate. You will have your things moved into one room by noon, or there will be punishment."

Haruhi did not need to look to her right to see the wide, amber eyes looking up at her.

"I'm sorry, Haru-chan," Hunny whispered, sounding very much like a child. But there was not an ounce of regret in his voice; only the slightest bit of discomfort.

Haruhi did not answer. She did not have anything nice to say. Trying her best to ignore Hunny, she tilted her body and peered down the row. Hikaru and Kaoru both looked frantic; they had been separated.

"Students will be in their dorm rooms at nine o' clock every night, and leaving for any reason will warrant punishment." General Zev spoke as if reading an enjoyable book. "All extracurricular activities have been thus-forth cancelled." When a murmur of commotion passed through the students, he added in a fierce bark, "You are all criminals, have you forgotten? Consider the Headmistress generous for allowing you to remain unchained."

Haruhi did not know how serious that statement was, and she was by no means excited to find out. "Shit just got real," she heard Hikaru mutter somewhere to her right, but the words did not register in her mind.

The General pursed his thick lips and ran his dark eyes down the line of students. Then, he took a step forwards on the dewy lawn and said, both casually and firmly, "Breakfast started five minutes ago. You have fifteen minutes to eat. Do not talk."

One of the soldiers blew into a whistle, and the day began.

* * *

It took the better part of five minutes for Hunny to move his belongings to room 155. Neither he nor Haruhi said a word the entire time, until the boy unpacked a box of cigarettes onto the bedside table.

"Not in my room, you don't." Haruhi paused and turned away from the window seat, where she was setting up a bed for herself. "Hand them over."

Hunny frowned and crossed his arms, keeping the pack firmly in his fist. "It's my room too, now. I think I should be allowed to smoke in my own room."

"But it's _not_ your 'own room'! We have to share it, and sharing means that I get a choice in whether or not my clothes all smell like vomit."

"It doesn't smell like vomit!" Hunny retorted, subtly sniffing his own collar. "And shouldn't I get that choice too? Huh?"

Haruhi did not answer him. She ignored the petulant glare on her back, and went back to folding her blanket around the seat cushion. There was no way on Earth she was going to share a bed with a boy, and especially not _that one_. The window seat was a few inches too short for Haruhi's body, but it would work if she pulled her knees up to her chest.

"Alright," she said to no one in particular when she had finished. "That's all done."

Hunny looked up from the cigarette pack, which he had been reading somewhat diligently out of boredom. "You don't have to sleep there, you know."

Haruhi felt a tick of anger in her brow. "We're no longer having this discussion."

"No, no," Hunny said, shaking his head. He sat up and swung his legs over the edge of the bed. "I mean, I'll take the window seat. You can have the bed."

For a moment, Haruhi was stunned. This spoiled brat... "What's the catch?" she asked bluntly, her face expressionless.

"There is none." Smiling shakily, Hunny tossed the cigarettes onto the bedside table and stood up. He grabbed his silk pillow and his stuffed bunny. "It's the gentlemanly thing to do right? I _am_ a Host, after all."

It was clear what he was doing. Haruhi could tell from the spark in his eyes and the way he sort of puffed out his chest, exactly what his intentions were. But whether or not he was only doing it to get on her good side, Haruhi couldn't pass up the opportunity.

"I mean, if you don't _want_ the bed..." She was already grabbing her pillow. Then, she paused. "Listen, senpai, I'm really sorry you got stuck sharing a room with me instead of one of the other guys."

"Why are _you_ sorry?" Hunny raised one eyebrow as he crossed the room. "I'm the one who's making _you_ uncomfortable by being here." There was the slightest tinge of sadness in his voice, but for the most part he remained neutral, his gaze blatantly avoiding Haruhi.

Haruhi started to argue this point, but it would have been pointless. They both knew what they thought of each other. There were no lies. No pretending.

"So," Haruhi began as she straightened out the comforter on her bed. "Your little brother must have an awful impression of the school after this morning."

Hunny snorted. "Chika's a wimp. He won't last a week of this new system. Mom and Dad always babied him."

"And they didn't baby you?" Haruhi found this hard to believe.

"Not in the least." The boy furrowed his brow, then looked amused "What, just because I was sick didn't mean they loved me."

It took a few moments for this to sink in, and a few more for Haruhi to recall exactly what sickness this was. One of the twins had mentioned it to her weeks back, but it had seemed so unlikely at the time that she had dismissed it.

"Oh," she found herself saying. "You were a leukemia patient, right?"

"Right." Hunny grimaced, as if from a bad taste in his throat. "Diagnosed when I was seven. My parents went ahead and made Chika the heir. It's all he's ever wanted, but he isn't happy with it because he thinks _I_ want it..." He shrugged. "I don't know, I don't pretend to understand what he thinks."

"Wait a second." Haruhi held out one hand. "Your parents went ahead and gave your future up? That's..."

"Horrible?" Hunny shrugged, the corners of his mouth tugging upward ironically. "Of couse. Wouldn't expect any less of them. Humans are all the same." He said this with a ring of finality; he was done discussing his childhood. Sinking down into the window seat cushions, Hunny reached into his pocket and fingered the clearly-outlined box there, but he did not pull out a cigarette as Haruhi expected. He just rested his hand against the cardboard and stretched his mouth open in a wide yawn.

Haruhi observed him for a moment. The circles beneath his eyes looked darker than ever, and his skin had an almost grayish tint to it. Somewhere in her chest, his words had sparked a little pang of sympathy, delicate and ghostly, barely there at all. And as Haruhi watched him pretend to sleep against the cold window pane, his face innocent and cherubic, she couldn't help but feel as though he might have deserved better than what she'd been giving him.

* * *

Breakfast was a strange affair.

Students were allowed to go about their business, sitting at their usual tables and chatting softly with their friends, but the dining hall now had all the joviality of a prison yard. Headmistress Suoh seemed to have an entire army at her disposal, for all the black-garbed men that seemed to stand around every corner. But as for procedure, Haruhi couldn't help but feel as if, to put it simply, the shit had not yet hit the fan. Other than roommates and the fact that they were no longer allowed to talk in the hallway by threat of detention, there was no major obvious hazard in the new regime. Haruhi wondered with faint dread in her gut just what would go wrong, and when.

"Food's no worse," Hikaru commented lightly after no less than ten minutes of solid silence. He had a mound of slightly grey eggs on the end of his fork, and was eying them with haughty distaste. It was the first positive thing he'd said all morning; he had been in a particularly grouchy mood today.

"What, did you expect they'd poison us?" Hunny snapped.

Kyouya interrupted before the spat could turn into a full-on argument. "Alright, now that we know what position we're in we need to be as careful as possible about how we communicate."

"What do you mean?" Hikaru asked, his mouth full of food.

Haruhi was the first one to answer. "We can't let anyone know what we're up to," she said, eyeing Kyouya for approval. He nodded curtly and took a sip of his tea. "Security's already getting tighter. We just all have to be really careful."

"So what do you suggest we do?" This came from Kasanoda, who had become a permanent fixture at the table, along with an absent-looking Nekozawa. "I mean, it would get suspicious if we talked after hours in someone's room."

Renge suddenly sat up straighter in her seat, her caramel eyes wide. "Ooh, I could help with that. They'd never have to know we were meeting. I mean, if other students would let me phase through their walls..."

"Good luck climbing up to get us on the third floor." Kaoru waggled his finger between himself and Mori, and the table fell silent again.

"We'll think of something," Tamaki threw in, sticking one finger smartly into the air. "Until then, Operation Suh-piss-guh-pee is on hold."

_Suh-piss-guh-pee_? Haruhi found herself wondering. She must have had a funny look on her face, because Hikaru leaned over and whispered, "S-P-S-G-P-E. Sneak Past Security Guards to Plan Escape. He told us all about it before you and Hunny-senpai got down here."

Well. The boy certainly wasn't lacking in creativity.

"And until then?" Kaoru asked.

Kyouya looked over at Reiko, and a brief understanding passed between them. Finally he answered, "We wait until we know more."

* * *

But as the weekend continued, nothing further happened. More men in black patrolled the campus at all hours - Haruhi could see them in the moonlight of early morning, moving in the shadows by the lake - and curfew was enforced at nine sharp every night, but nothing reeked of violent overthrow. No one ever saw the infamous Headmistress; it appeared that she spoke solely through the Indian-skinned General Zev, whose wide shoulders certainly had a more demanding effect than Headmistress Suoh's tiny kimono. But Haruhi did not doubt that the woman was just as intimidating as her bodyguards; Haruhi had only seen the woman once, and she already felt threatened by her. Of course, that may have had more to do with Reiko's visions than with her own single sighting. Things were not bad yet, but Haruhi did not like the stirring she felt in her stomach when she thought of the prophetic drawings. There was always room to grow, she thought.

Then, Monday came, and with it the first unsettling signs of the shift in leadership.

"Um, please take your seats quietly, and, uh, pull out a pencil and some paper..." Haruhi's geometry teacher, who was ordinarily a nervous wreck, looked on the verge of breakdown as she eyed the burly men standing in the back of the classroom. They were there to "monitor", they had said; make sure that none of the teachers were doing anything to upset the new system.

Or, as Kyouya had worded it, "keep the students uninformed." Make sure there was no pro-mutant propaganda being spewed. Bonus points to the teachers who degraded the students and told them they were worthless (only the gym teacher did this, really). Of course, Haruhi could only go on what Kyouya had derived from his unsettling clairvoyance. The men weren't really _doing_ anything, other than looking like violent death in a suit.

On Tuesday morning, the fence went up. It started in the back of the campus, right at the shores of the lake, and by nightfall on Thursday the army of workers had extended it until it closed in front of the school. It was ten feet tall, topped with points that looked like fangs, and the sight sent a chill down Haruhi's spine.

"I can't get them now!" Hunny kept wailing. "I'm gonna die!" But his heart was not in the complaints; even he knew that there were bigger problems brewing than his loss of cigarettes, and the fence was only the least of their worries.

Because on Friday afternoon, Haruhi returned from class and found cold iron bars encasing the window. She jiggled the pane, but the bars were tight and effective. The window held fast in place, and all at once Haruhi felt a strange tightness in her lungs.

They could pretend that nothing was happening; that Reiko's visions were inaccurate, and Headmistress Suoh was going to turn out a just and kindly old woman. But these bars, this prison yard fence... here was the solid proof. It was undeniable. The frivolous, elegant Ouran Institute was changing, bit by bit, into a prison. And it was only going to get worse from here.

* * *

_I really hate OCs, so I didn't want to write General Zev. But you should have seen the Headmistress. I hate myself a little for writing her the way I did, and be very glad I replaced her in this chapter. She was like a hybrid of Dolores Umbridge and Yubaba from _Spirited Away_. I think I'm going to keep her mainly behind the scenes until I find a better way to characterize her. _


	10. Chapter 10

**_A/N_:** _Hi. Sorry this took awhile, but this chapter refused to be written. And it was initially even longer, but the last bit wasn't working so I cut it out. This is a considerably slower chapter, after that last two faster-paced ones. We meet a new character and learn a couple of backstories. Nothing too exciting. But trust me, the next one makes up for it. _

_Dear BFF: I'm sorry this chapter does not contain as much of AU!Hunny as you probably would have hoped. I tried, but it didn't really fit with the rest of the chapter. I will certainly make it up to you in the next one. _

* * *

**Student Rules of Conduct, effective October 25, 1999**

1. No student shall be outside of their assigned dormitory room after 9:00 p.m. every night, or before 7:30 a.m. every morning.

2. There will be no speaking or noises otherwise deemed disruptive in the halls before, during, or after school hours.

3. Students are prohibited from congregating in dormitory rooms other than their assigned quarters at any time. Any meetings must take place in the library, dining hall, or other public areas deemed suitable by the Headmistress.

4. It is strictly forbidden for any student to demonstrate their mutant status at any time. Any violator of this code will be punished to the fullest measures.

* * *

"This is bullshit," Hikaru hissed, waving the offending sheet of paper in the aisle space between himself and Haruhi. Around them, the other first years were muttering in confusion.

"Silence!" Kosmin finished passing out the papers and stopped in front of the teacher's desk, his arms crossed in front of his large chest. He was a boulder of a security guard, with tanned skin and eyes the color of dried blood. Where Zev looked smooth and commanding, Kosmin looked like someone who might pull a gun on a dripping faucet. Or, as it seemed now, on a group of mumbling students; his massive fingers brushed against the bulk at his hip. "Headmistress Suoh's word is law here, and I would strongly advise that you follow these rules-" He gave a crude, animalistic smile "-lest you wind up, er, absent for class the next day."

"That's sick," Renge muttered, her lips barely moving. Haruhi felt a rumble of anger deep in her throat, but she said nothing; she merely dipped her chin in agreement.

Kosmin waved one huge hand at the trembling teacher and said, "Now continue." But the teacher seemed hardly capable of standing, much less speaking, in Kosmin's presence. It wasn't until the guard took his usual seat at the back of the room that Ms. Tatenaka started back into her shaky explanation of congruent triangle rules.

Haruhi was just beginning to feel her mind wandering when, as if through an invisible quill, a short, shimmering phrase appeared on the dark wood of her desk: _9:45 in Kyouya's room. _

A jolt of panic went through Haruhi's stomach, and she sent a reproachful look at Hikaru, who smirked. Then, he rubbed his fingers together in a silent snap, and the illusion shifted: _Don't worry, Kosmin's asleep_.

Haruhi hazarded a look; indeed, Kosmin was already slumped over with his chin against his huge chest.

The message changed again. _So you're coming tonight?_

Frowning, Haruhi shrugged. _What's it for_? she mouthed slowly.

This time, the answer came from Kaoru, on Haruhi's left. _New students are arriving tomorrow. Kyouya wants to discuss informing the student body. _

In the back of the classroom, Kosmin let out a dog-like grunt in his sleep. A few students giggled, which roused the man from his nap. In a split second, the illusion vanished from Haruhi's desk, and the twins both went back to their math notes, leaving empty air and an exasperated look on Haruhi's face.

* * *

"We have forty-two new students scheduled to arrive over the next week. All of them have been taken from their parents against their wills, and several will not understand why they are coming here. They will probably arrive with a fear of the administration prematurely instilled in them, and one of two things will happen. Either it will be easy to convince them because of their distrust, or they will be wary of us as well. I hope for the former, of course, but we must be prepared for a struggle."

Kyouya's speech was followed by a long silence, during which the boy adjusted his glasses and examined a wrinkle in his button-down shirt.

Renge was the first to speak. She was wearing a pink bathrobe, and her skin was pale from phasing such a large number of people through the dorm walls. "Well what are we supposed to do? Pass out pamphlets or something?"

"Of course not," Kyouya answered curtly. "But it will be important to befriend them. Make alliances. And this isn't all about the new students, either. Everyone needs to be informed."

Tamaki pursed his lips as he thought. "Renge, couldn't you just phase into their rooms and talk with them or something?"

"Don't test me, boy." Renge's brow was wrinkled, showing her exhaustion.

"This is precisely why we're having this meeting," Kyouya explained. "Renge, I'm afraid that Tamaki is right - you will be of use to us over the next few weeks. But I assure you, you will not be doing all of the work alone. This will be a join-effort. The ten of us are the leaders, and we'll work together to make sure that everyone stays safe."

Hikaru raised himself up onto his elbows; he was sprawled across the bed on his stomach, watching the conversation like a tennis match. "So basically, we just go up to anyone we don't recognize, try to get them alone, and then scare the hell out of them talking about this thing?"

Kyouya nodded, the tiniest of smiles on his faces. "Precisely."

"Sounds simple enough."

Of course, it was not simple. Haruhi had said nothing over the course of the meeting, but the whole idea bothered her. Gaining the trust of forty-two scared kids was tough enough, but doing it under the radar seemed downright impossible. She didn't want to think about what would happen if any of them were caught conspiring...

"Well, let's all go get some sleep," Kyouya said in closing. "We have a lot to think about."

* * *

The next morning, true to Kyouya's prediction, a cluster of white-faced, quivering children arrived just as breakfast was starting. They came in two stiff lines, unassumingly taking seats at the empty tables near the exit. Most, Haruhi noticed, were of the elementary or junior high age, but there were a few gloomy-looking teenagers who glared with frightful intensity at the other students. The room was filled with total silence, and Haruhi was hesitant to even take a bite of her breakfast, lest it be too assuming. The others at the table all seemed to have the same idea; no one had spoken since sitting down.

"Excuse me, is it alright if I have this seat?"

Haruhi had not even seen the tall, lanky boy approach her. In fact, his silent arrival seemed to have caught everyone at the table off guard; even Reiko visibly jumped in her seat.

"Go away, Chika." Hunny looked up at his younger brother. "You can't sit here."

Chika looked hurt for a moment, then his expression changed into one of furious offense. "I never said I wanted to sit here. I just want the chair."

Hunny's eyes darkened. "Well then take it and leave," he snapped. "Just because we're at the same school doesn't mean you can come bothering me all the time. I have better things to do than deal with an irritating kid brother."

" ..." Tamaki reached out one hand as if to lay it on his friend's shoulder, but the boy shoved it away without even looking.

"And I have better things to do than babysit an annoying brat," Chika spat back. "Stop being so conceited, Mitsukuni. Did you ever stop to think that not everybody is dying to sit at your table?" The boy hoisted the chair up with one arm and started back towards an empty table by the window, pausing only to give his brother one last hateful look.

Hunny did not even say anything. He sat for a moment with his arms crossed in front of his chest, looking torn between homicidal rage and petty irritation. Finally, he shoved his tray forward on the table and said, "I don't feel good. Someone throw that away for me." Without a single look towards his friends, he stood up, shoved his hands into the pockets of his slacks, and trooped out of the room, his shoulders hunched.

"Well," Hikaru said, his mouth full of no less than four strips of bacon, "that was a refreshing way to kick-start the morning. I'm woken up."

Tamaki gave a sad sigh. "I'd heard they didn't get along, but it's worse than I thought."

"Don't get any ideas, Tamaki." Kyouya gave him a sidelong glance. "For everyone's sake."

But Tamaki just shook his head, looking dramatically mournful. "Living under the same roof, but never looking each other in the eye. How could life be so cruel? Just think, if it hadn't been for childhood leukemia the brothers would be thick as thieves!"

"I don't know," Hikaru said. "I think they'd still both be assholes."

"And I'm not so sure it's the leukemia that's the problem here," Kaoru added.

Before Tamaki could continue any further with what was rapidly turning into an all-out rant, Kyouya looked up sharply at Mori, who had been observing in perfect silence, and said, "Would you mind checking on him?" The tall, stone-faced boy nodded in expressionless understanding, and stood up from his seat, making a move to follow his friend.

As soon as Mori was out of earshot, Haruhi turned to Kyouya and asked something that had been burning in her mind for weeks. "I noticed Mori seems to care about Hunny quite a bit. Did they know each other before they came here?"

Kyouya stirred his tea around with a spoon, and pushed his glasses up. "No one is really sure of Mori 's intentions, but it has been speculated that they are out of displaced affection for the younger brother he was separated from."

Haruhi blinked slowly. "Mori has a brother? I didn't know..."

"He doesn't like to talk about him," Renge cut in. "Tragic story, really."

"Renge, would you like to do the honors?" Kyouya suggested. The girl looked positively delighted.

"Of course!" Renge cleared her throat, took a deep breath, and started: "It all started when Mori was eight years old-"

"If you start from there, you'll never get to the good part." Hikaru rolled his eyes.

"_It all started when Mori was eight years old_," Renge repeated, pointedly ignoring Hikaru. "And he discovered that he had the extraordinary ability to harness electricity! But sadly, he couldn't control his powers, and he wound up frightening his parents. They loved him very much, but were scared of the mutant their beloved son was becoming, so they locked him in his room day and night, sending in only countless doctors and servants with trays of leftover food."

"You couldn't possibly know any of that," Kaoru interrupted. "You're making stuff up for the sake of drama!"

Haruhi gave both of the twins an annoyed look, which shut them up.

"As I was saying," Renge continued, "his parents were frightened of him, and he was not allowed to be around his darling younger brother, Satoshi. As a direct result of neglect, Satoshi fell into the wrong crowd and started hanging around with bad people-"

"Druggies aren't bad," Hikaru protested, "they're just passionate."

"-and his older brother, who didn't dare go against the wishes of their parents, was powerless to stop it!"

A sniffle came from Tamaki's end of the table. "That part gets me every time," he confessed.

Haruhi furrowed her brow. "So, because of his brother, Mori feels overprotective of Hunny?"

"We haven't gotten to the most important part yet," Renge said. "One cold, December night, Satoshi's rebel friends decided to steal a car, and drag Satoshi along with them. Mori caught wind of this, and followed them on foot."

"Which makes no logical sense," Kyouya said calmly.

"He caught them driving away from the scene of the crime in the stolen car, and he managed to scare away the rebel kids with his powers and convince Satoshi to come back home." Renge clutched her chest dramatically. "But alas, they were caught by the police, and Mori was arrested for stealing the car!"

"He took total responsibility for the crime," Tamaki interjected, "and said that he'd forced his brother to come along! Isn't that noble?"

"Um..." Haruhi was still trying to absorb the whole story. It was impossible to know exactly how much Renge had added for impact, but it was definitely a more dramatic story than she had expected from such a mild-mannered boy. "That sounds pretty awful."

"I know!" Renge sighed theatrically. "I could just sob thinking about it!"

Kaoru slumped in his seat. "I don't get why everyone makes such a big deal out of _his_ tragic past. We all have one. It's just part of being a mutant."

"Yeah," Hikaru agreed. "First line in the user's manual: 'There will always be someone out there trying to make you the scapegoat. Sooner or later, you just learn to deal with it'."

* * *

In hindsight, any number of future events might have not happened at all had Haruhi not taken the back stairwell to her classroom after breakfast. Because when she rounded the dusty landing, she found a tiny twig of a boy sprawled sleepily across the windowsill. For a moment she thought nothing of it, until she realized that he was wearing a winter coat and a red knit hat, as though he had just come in from outside. There were smears of muddy water on the parquet around his feet, and tucked behind the potted bamboo plant was a black suitcase, clearly attempting to be out of sight.

"Hey." Haruhi paused, unsure of how to approach the kid. But at the sound of her voice he whirled around in shock, his dark eyes wide.

"Holy shit!" the kid exclaimed, clutching his chest. "Don't sneak up on people. I thought you were one of those musclehead soldier guys!"

"Relax," Haruhi said, quirking one eyebrow, "I was just going to make sure you weren't lost."

The boy scowled. "Well, I'm clearly not, so get out of here." He turned back towards the window, looking incredibly small next to the tall frame.

"Alright, I'm leaving." Haruhi began to back up, watching the child's hostile, hunched shoulders. A feeling of sad familiarity passed through her. "But just in case you didn't know," she went on slowly, "this is a terrible hiding place. At least find someplace where the, um, 'muscleheads' won't find you."

"And why should I listen to you?" the boy snapped, whipping his head back around. He had dark, old eyes and a mean frown, something dreadful in someone so small.

"Because," Haruhi reasoned, leaning down to pick up the suitcase, "I've been here longer. I know what I'm talking about."

The boy seemed to consider this for a moment, his face shifting between hostility and doubt. Finally he sighed and said, "Fine, but if you turn me in I'll kick your ass."

Haruhi stifled a laugh. "Don't worry, I won't." She took the suitcase handle in both hands and started up the stairs. "We're all in the same boat here, kid."

He began to shuffle behind her, looking warily from beneath his furrowed brow. The steps creaked as he followed Haruhi up to the second floor, like a watchful shadow. Finally, as they reached the top landing and turned onto a dark, narrow hallway, the kid spoke again. "So is there any way out?"

"Do you think any of us would be here if there was?" Haruhi didn't look back as she spoke; she kept her eyes trained on the hall ahead, her ears tuned in to every creak.

The boy frowned at this, and quickened his pace to walk beside Haruhi. "I really, really have to get home though. Are you sure there's nothing anyone can do? A place like this has to have a million ways out!" His voice had risen in volume, and Haruhi placed a finger to her lips to quiet him down.

"Sure, there are ways out," Haruhi whispered, "but they're protected like crazy." She watched the room numbers pass by - 169, 167. "What makes it anymore urgent that _you_ get out than the rest of us?"

"Because my mom's dying."

Haruhi felt her breath catch in her throat. Her pace faltered, and for a long moment she could not find her voice. "I-I'm sorry," she stammered at last. "I know what you're going through."

"You couldn't possibly know," the boy growled, his face screwed up in anger. "Don't try to tell me you understand."

Haruhi kept her mouth closed, though she was dying to say a thousand things to reassure the poor kid. Her heart ached just at the memory of her own mother, separated from Haruhi in those last months by a wall of Etsuko's cruel judgement...

The two reached room 155, and Haruhi pulled the small brass key out of her pocket. "You can stay here until the end of the school day," she said, creaking the door open, "or at least until you feel up to going back to class. You can stash your suitcase in the wardrobe, and don't answer the door for anyone."

The boy looked at her with narrow, judging eyes. He seemed to be considering something with great gravity. After several heavy moments, he nodded curtly and said, "Thank you for your help."

Haruhi half-smiled, and matched his nod. "No problem. Like I said, we're all in the same boat here." She started to leave, then added, "If ever need anything, my name's Haruhi."

"Shiro," the kid said, the smallest of smiles on his pale face. "It's been nice to meet you." And then, without a further word or glance, he closed the door between them. Haruhi heard the deadbolt slide into place - an extra measure of security against the "muscleheads".

Later on, Haruhi would think back on that afternoon and wonder what had made her act so generous towards a rude little kid who was so far removed from her own problems. And truly, at the time, she had not known. If anything, it was because she saw the slightest fragment of herself in that sad, troubled pair of eyes.

* * *

"You had a full conversation with him, and you didn't even find out what his powers are?" Hikaru draped himself over the back of the chair he was straddling, and gave Haruhi an exasperated look.

"Sorry," she snapped in return, "I was a little preoccupied with hiding him from Zev. Besides, he looked about eleven. I don't think he would have been much help."

Kaoru stuck one finger smartly in the air. "Hey, Hunny looks like he's eleven, and he's helping us."

Haruhi sighed deeply. She was too tired to argue such an empty point, and wanted nothing more to crawl into bed and fall into a deep sleep. Unfortunately, that bed was currently occupied by Kaoru, who was spread across the mattress on his stomach. Hikaru had taken the desk chair, and Renge was working on schoolwork in the window seat, leaving Haruhi to sit cross-legged on her own floor. Behind the closed bathroom door, she could hear the heavy pattering of the shower.

"He'll be done in a minute," Haruhi noted. "You should probably leave soon."

"That pipsqueak spends enough time on his hair for someone to play eight full games of cards," Hikaru scoffed. "We're staying."

Haruhi groaned and leaned back against the wardrobe. Running one hand through her hair, she stifled a yawn. "I can't stop thinking about the story Renge told this morning," she admitted. "About Mori."

Kaoru raised an eyebrow. "What about it?"

"It just seems so unfair," Haruhi said. "I mean, for a kid to be that alone. It just shouldn't happen."

"And yet it does," Hikaru replied. "None of us have it easy."

Renge gave a bitter little laugh, looking up from her assignment. "Rule number two of being a mutant? 'If you think you've had it hard, the person sitting next to you has always had it harder." Kaoru reached across the gap to give her a high five, and the girl blushed slightly.

Haruhi looked slowly between the three of them. "And what's been so awful about your lives, if you don't mind my asking?"

"Don't mind a bit." Hikaru grinned sardonically. "It's a pretty short, simple story for us: when Kaoru and I were five, we were kidnapped. Some science people wanted us. Of course, this didn't go over too well with our parents-"

"They had to pay ¥10,000,000 in ransom money to get us back," Kaoru interrupted. "And when they finally did, we weren't allowed out of the house for years. The hired us a private tutor, and there were all these bodyguards all over the place."

"Talk about a lack of freedom," Hikaru said. "Finally, when we were twelve, someone tried to kidnap us again-"

"Only this time he didn't even make it inside the house. But our parents were so paranoid that they shipped us off here, totally under the radar."

Haruhi pretended to be very interested in a string on her pajama pants while the twins talked. By just looking at the light-hearted boys, one would never guess that they'd had such a traumatic childhood. And the way they discussed it, so nonchalant... It was unnatural.

"Thinking about it," Kaoru went on, "I don't think anyone in the Club actually had a normal childhood."

"Mine was normal," Renge started to say, but Hikaru cut her off.

"All that trauma just helped us grow into the intriguing, charismatic characters we are today." He waggled his brow in a way Haruhi figured was supposed to be enchanting, but it just made her giggle, which in turn made Kaoru and Renge laugh. Hikaru looked indignant, and was just opening his mouth to protest when the sound of the shower cut off. The three guests hopped to their feet and gathered their belongings.

"See you in class," Kaoru said with a smile and a salute, and the three disappeared through the papered wall.

_That will never not be weird_, Haruhi thought to herself. Her legs felt like pins and needles from sitting on them for so long, and she winced as she got to her feet and stumbled over to her bed. The sheets were crumpled where Kaoru had been laying, and the air smelled faintly of cinnamon and cologne. Haruhi pulled back the sheets and moved her pillows into place, flattening out the wrinkles as she went.


	11. Chapter 11

_**A/N: **__So I wrote most of this chapter in one sitting back in mid January. Finished it, reread it, absolutely hated it. I had to do the whole thing over again from scratch. So I'm sorry for the delay, but it's much better now than it would have been if I hadn't taken all of this time. _

_Also, I'm really sorry that I haven't been replying to reviews lately. I've just been so caught up in other things that I haven't really had the time. Usually I'll see the email notification on my iPod, but by the time I get a computer I've forgotten all about it. I'm going to try to be better about that in the future, and sometime next week I'll sit down and reply to the last chapter's reviews. _

_This chapter isn't the happiest. But then, this just isn't a very happy story. Things won't get really bad for awhile, though, so don't worry._

_

* * *

_

With the first of November came a bone-chilling freeze that seemed to invade the school like an invisible army. It crept in through the cracks around the windows, and with no heating system to speak of, seasoned students took to wearing ski coats and thick scarves just to walk downstairs for breakfast. Tap water ran cold, turning the prospect of a warm shower into a distant dream, and with the sudden growth of the student body, there were no longer enough spare blankets to go around on the coldest nights. Students had to make do with what they had - or with what they could steal from their neighbors.

The coldest day of the month so far found Haruhi walking back from her last class alone, wrapped up in a patched wool coat and a scratchy grey scarf. It had been almost a month, but the emptiness of the halls still struck her as strange. The serpentine hallways and mismatched paintings were all the same, but they felt darker, like there was some unseen evil waiting behind every door.

Haruhi opened her dorm room door, set her books down on the dresser, and was just about to collapse back into bed when she noticed something out of place - a small, wrinkled pad of paper, sitting wide open on the bedside table. Haruhi recognized it immediately: Reiko's sketchbook.

The temptation was sickening, and it was all Haruhi could do not to look as she moved past the table. There were so many answers in that book, so many things she could stop guessing about. Was there anything else explaining the significance of the number nine? Were there any more clues as to when this horrible thing would happen? And most of all, who was going to die? Haruhi started to reach for the sketchbook, but drew her hand back sharply. She was desperately curious, yes, but she also knew that there were things in that book she would rather not know. Things Reiko wouldn't want her to know. Trying her best to avert her eyes, Haruhi settled onto the bed and began to think diligently about unimportant things - the math lesson, the weather, what coat she would wear to bed tonight.

Her eyes began to stray.

_Chemistry homework. The tea stain on her khaki pants. The crack in the ceiling that looked like a face. _

But a thought occurred to her, and for a dire moment she stopped trying to fight the curiosity. What if the book was open for a reason? Whether it was fate, or by Reiko's design... What if the drawing displayed was important, and by averting her eyes Haruhi was avoiding knowledge that she _needed_? It was an unlikely answer, but enough to crack Haruhi's resolve. She reached for the sketchbook, her stomach fluttering...

_Aunt Etsuko's yappy dog. That restaurant back home that Dad likes. The English assignment due next week. _But nothing was enough to distract her. Her fingers closed around the book, and, her heart pounding, she looked.

The drawing was small and light, the pencil strokes hardly visible at a distance, but the shapes were clear. It depicted a battle, but not the sort featured in Haruhi's nightmares for the past month. This battle was between two creatures: a large, thin dog, and a savage wolf. The wolf had its jaw clenched around the dog's neck, drawing a stream of grey blood that stained the dog's light fur. It was impossible to tell from the sketch whether the dog was fighting back, but Haruhi had a bad feeling the the situation was in the wolf's favor.

The question, though: what on earth did this mean? From what Haruhi's understood, Reiko's drawing were usually straight-forward, all but the page of nines. Could this be another figurative drawing, or was it a literal representation of a future event? It was impossible to tell.

Haruhi started to turn the page, but a pang of guilt cut her actions off short, and she placed the sketchbook back where she had found it. The drawing had been of little help, and had only confused her more. Feeling a bit let-down, she pushed it to the back of her mind and tried her best to concentrate on other things.

* * *

"What I don't get, is how on Earth that's supposed to say 'cell'." Tamaki gestured emphatically at the notebook, his voice raising just a bit too loud for the quiet library. Haruhi put a finger to her lips, and sank back into her chair.

"And what _I_ don't get," she replied tartly, "is why you can't just write your own notes during class, instead of copying the twins'."

Tamaki pouted. "You don't like helping me?"

"I never _said _that." Haruhi shook her head. Tamaki hadn't answered her question, but she was too distracted by the thought of the drawing to argue. She wanted terribly to mention it to Tamaki, but out of respect for Reiko's privacy she held her tongue, trying instead to focus on the notebook in front of her.

"Tamaki," she found herself saying, her voice feeling strange and heavy, "do you ever get the feeling that there's something really big we're missing?"

"What do you mean?" Tamaki asked.

Haruhi rubbed wearily at her temples. "I mean, haven't you ever considered that the answer to all of this could be entirely different than what we're expecting?"

"Well yeah, I've thought about it" Tamaki frowned, confused. "But what do you-"

"Forget about it." Haruhi sighed. "It's just a thought I had."

"C'mon, Haruhi! Tell me!"

"It's really nothing important, believe me."

"Haru-"

The developing argument was cut short when the library doors swung open, and two tall figures in matching wool coats sauntered in. The guard on duty - slightly smaller than Zev, but still resembling a large bear - gave them a disdainful sneer.

"Well if it isn't our best girl." Before Haruhi knew it, the chair next to her scooted backwards and Hikaru Hitachiin slid into it. He had a red scarf wrapped up to his chin and leather gloves on his hands; the air in the library felt no warmer than outside.

Kaoru took the seat on Haruhi's other side, and with a stifled squeak of shock from Tamaki, he tossed his arm over Haruhi's shoulders. "We just came to get our notes back from Boss."

"But if he's not through with them," Hikaru added, tweaking a strand of Haruhi's short hair, "we have no objections to sticking around until he is."

Haruhi stared at him coldly. "Tamaki's easily enough distracted as it is. We don't need you two in here making it worse." She entirely ignored Tamaki's indignant gape, and went on reading the page of notes in front of her.

Hikaru frowned. "We hardly see you outside of class anymore. What gives?"

"Yeah," Kaoru added. "We haven't really gotten to talk to you in weeks." He stuck out his lower lip in an exaggerated pout.

Haruhi clenched her pencil and spoke in a controlled voice: "You guys know 'what gives'. And 'what gives' is watching us right now, so be quiet." She held a finger over her lips, glancing hesitantly at the guard by the door. The man was fully engrossed in a loose thread on his shirt, but Haruhi didn't want to take any chances.

Tamaki turned up his nose. "You two devil twins are interrupting Haruhi's delicate translation. Now begone!"

"Begone?" Hikaru snorted. "Who talks like that anymore?"

Tamaki ignored this. "You're only jealous because Haruhi chose me to grace with her presence this afternoon. Now kindly leave us in silence and-"

Hikaru scowled, and there was a sharp thud from beneath the table. At that moment, several things happened very quickly. Tamaki's words cut off with a sharp yelp, and then the air around them seemed to explode with a strange, vibrating energy. Haruhi's eyes snapped up from the biology notes just in time to see Tamaki's figure blur and expand, and a quiver of panic rose up in the back of her throat.

"Stop!" she heard her voice shout out, but there was nothing that anyone could do. In a sudden _pop_, Tamaki disappeared.

And in his place, furry and white and standing at just over five feet, was a very startled llama.

On any other day, Haruhi would have laughed. She would have laughed until she cried. But now, all she could do was stare in complete horror at the scene before her. She hardly dared to breath, lest it pique the attention of the guard. But it was much too late for that.

"Hey, freak, that's against the Headmistress' rules!" The guard sounded just as shocked as Haruhi and the twins; there was confusion and anxiety mixed in with the anger on his beefy face as he strode over to the scene. "None of that mutant crap anywhere on campus!"

_What have you done?_ Haruhi thought, hazarding a glance over at the twins. Both of them had gone sickly pale in the face. Across the table, Tamaki clucked anxiously.

The guard reached the table in three long strides. He seemed to tower over the four like a sentinel. "Looks like we got ourselves a little rule breaker, huh?" Sneering sadistically, he grabbed a fistful of Tamaki's white fur in one meaty hand. Tamaki made a shrill, startled noise. "This just isn't your day, son."

Hikaru stood up so fast that his chair tipped backwards, hitting the floor with a violent clatter. "Hey dumbass, it wasn't his fault!"

The short silence that followed was unbearable. "You idiot," Kaoru whispered. Haruhi could feel her heart beating hard in her throat as she watched the guard's expression change from one of morbid amusement, to one of pure sadistic pleasure. His fingers flexing slowly, he let go of Tamaki and turned towards Hikaru.

The guard took the bait. "Really, now? You did this, did you?"

Hikaru gulped. His hands were visibly trembling. "I-I did. It was all me." It was a weak lie, and for one horrible moment Haruhi found herself hoping that the guard would buy it.

The guard looked doubtful, but a slight shrug confirmed the man's gullibility. " 'S long as I got somebody," he said amusedly. "Any one of you'd do for what we got planned."

Kaoru made a quick move towards his brother, but Haruhi caught him by the sleeve. _I don't want to lose them both_, a voice in her head chimed, but she quickly pushed the thought away. Biting her lip, she took Kaoru's hand in her own and watched numbly as a brawny hand yanked Hikaru from his seat. Looking up, she caught Hikaru's eyes with her own. The boy managed a toothy grin as he stumbled towards the library door: a promise that everything would be alright. A promise that he would return before they knew it.

In a heartbeat - a single breath - Hikaru and the guard were gone. And in the next moment, something seemed to snap inside of Kaoru. He yanked his hand free of Haruhi's, scratching her palm with his nails, and made a wild move for the closing door. Haruhi was just fast enough - she managed to grab the back of his coat with both hands before he made it too far.

"Let me go! They're gonna hurt him!" Kaoru fumbled with his coat buttons, pushing and struggling to get free, but Haruhi had a firm grip around his waist now. She bit her lip and locked her small hands, barely registering the tears welling up in her own eyes.

"It's not worth it, Kaoru," she said, her voice muffled by the fabric of the jacket. "You'll only get yourself in trouble., and then you won't be any help to him."

Kaoru did not realize what she was doing until it was too late. Haruhi stepped back, and the boy sank like marble to the floor, landing in a tangle of limbs beside his brother's toppled chair. He tried to move, but to no avail; he was paralyzed by gravity.

Haruhi wiped her eyes and turned to face Tamaki. He looked as shell-shocked as a llama ever could, staring at the library door with an expression of foggy horror. Haruhi reached out and gave his fur a tentative stroke, but he did not seem to notice.

Turning back towards the toppled chair and the forgotten notes, Haruhi tried to push Hikaru from her mind. They would be no use to him if they panicked and fought, but she had no better ideas. She did not even know where they were keeping him, and until she knew that...

She paused, her fingers frozen on the glossy cover of the biology book. Because there was one person who would be able to find out where Hikaru was; one person who knew everything that went on behind the scenes.

If anyone could help them get Hikaru back, it was Kyouya.

* * *

" 'Any one of you'd do.' You're sure that that's exactly what he said?"

"Word for word." Rolling over onto her stomach, Haruhi tried to hold in an impatient sigh. "Still no ideas?"

Kyouya did not answer, but merely closed his eyes and tapped his pen against his forehead. His placidity was infuriating. Haruhi had not been expecting him to jump out of his chair and rush off to save Hikaru, of course, but she had expected him to do much more than sit there at his desk and murmur, "Interesting..." repeatedly, as though he was examining a case study.

"Maybe we're looking too much into it," Haruhi went on, watching Kyouya's face for any sign that he was listening to her. He gave none; he simply opened his eyes and made a short note on his clipboard. "I mean," Haruhi went on, "maybe he just meant that we're all the same, and one of us in detention is just as good as another."

Nodding his head, Kyouya laid down the clipboard. "Precisely. We can't let ourselves focus too long on the details. It's possible we'll never know what the man meant, and until then we can only wait this out and see what comes of it."

Curled up in the windowseat, Kaoru tore his eyes away from the darkening sky just long enough to shoot Haruhi a harsh, bitter glance. "That's stupid," he muttered, sounding very much like his brother. "Waiting around isn't helping him."

Kyouya pushed his glasses up his nose. "Kaoru, surely you didn't expect that we'd be able to do anything for him tonight."

Kaoru narrowed his eyes; his jaw twitched with suppressed rage. "I thought we'd be able to do a hell of a lot more than sit here and chat for an hour, while he's going through who-knows-what in this very building!"

"Kaoru..." Haruhi made a move to calm him down, but in all honesty she could relate fully with his feelings. Kyouya had been no help; her one idea had failed, and she was no more sure of how to help Hikaru than she had been that afternoon.

"It would be impractical," Kyouya continued, ignoring the fury in Kaoru's voice, "to rush into anything at this point."

"Impractical, my ass!" Kaoru pointed an unwavering finger at him. "What you mean is that it would ruin your little experiment, right? Hikaru's just your guinea pig!"

His voice seemed to echo in the small room, and Haruhi could still hear it in the uncomfortable silence that followed his outburst. Kyouya had not even looked up from his clipboard. Running a hand through his neat, black hair, he gave an exasperated sigh.

"Kaoru," he said with a tone of finality, "please realize that this is for the benefit of the school as a whole. It would be selfish to deny the student body the information that will be made available to us when Hikaru is returned."

Muted anger flashed in Kaoru's eyes for a moment, but he said nothing. His jaw tense and locked, he turned back towards the window.

Haruhi furrowed her brow. "You aren't being very fair, senpai."

But the boy just shrugged. "If life was about being fair, then I might consider it. But it's about getting ahead, and by allowing Hikaru to collect our research for us, we're gaining an advantage." He smoothed out a wrinkle on the front of his shirt.

Kyouya's reasoning made perfect sense, and in that moment, Haruhi hated him for it. She knew, in the back of her mind, that there was nothing they could do for Hikaru; there never had been, and there never would be. They had no idea what the security was like on the upper floor. But by sending Hikaru up there, they were getting an eyewitness account. It was a necessary evil, Haruhi figured. Lose some to gain some. It made her feel sick to her stomach.

For now, all any of them could do was wait.

* * *

By the time she returned to her room that night, Kaoru in tow - he categorically refused to share a room with Tamaki - she had forgotten all about Reiko's drawing. It was only after curfew, as she was setting up a bed for herself on the windowseat, that the image of the dog and the wolf slid back into her thoughts. Behind her, Hunny was flipping through a homework assignment and chewing loudly on a piece of gum. Kaoru, exhausted by the afternoon's turmoil, was already fast asleep on the other side of the bed.

"Hunny-senpai?" Haruhi began, keeping her voice soft for Kaoru's sake. "Can I ask you about something?"

Hunny moved the notebook so that his eyes peeked over. "That depends on what it is."

Taking a deep breath, Haruhi sat down on the window seat. "When I came in here after class, I found Reiko's notebook on the nightstand-"

"We were just talking," Hunny was quick to say, but Haruhi ignored him.

"-and it was open to something that I didn't really understand. A picture of a dog and a wolf." Haruhi waited for a reaction, but Hunny just looked blank. "Any ideas?"

He shook his head. "She tells me about most of them, but I never heard her mention anything like that."

Haruhi groaned. She did not want to bring this up with Reiko, but that seemed to be the only way she would find out anything. Rubbing a crick in the back of her neck, she asked, "Has she said anything else recently? Anything important?" She paused. "Anything that might help Hikaru?"

Hunny frowned. "No," he said, "nothing about him." His eyes locked with Haruhi's, and he finally lowered the notebook all the way. "I know what you're thinking. About that vision Reiko had at the start of the year."

"What vision?" But Haruhi knew exactly what he was talking about.

"It's not Hikaru," Hunny went on, sounding a bit disappointed. "So you can stop worrying about him, okay?" He managed a bleak smile, and then set down his notebook and reached for the bedside lamp. Beside him, Kaoru murmured something incomprehensible in his sleep.

"Wait," Haruhi found herself saying before Hunny's fingers reached the light switch. "If you know it's not him, then... you know who it _is_?"

Hunny shook his head. "She said she can't tell me. She doesn't want to worry anyone." As he spoke, that childish tremor of uncertainty crept into his voice. "She doesn't want to worry _me_."

It was not meant to be an answer; Hunny was determined to keep whatever he'd divined from Reiko's visions a secret. But in those few words, Haruhi suddenly understood.

"It's her, isn't it," she said, her breath shallow. "She's the one. That's why she won't-"

"I don't want to talk about it," Hunny cut in. His voice sounded both juvenile, and terribly discerning. He reached once more the light switch, and with a soft _click_ the room went pitch black.


	12. Chapter 12

_I am very, very sorry about my long break from posting. The truth of the matter is that I'm a full-time college student, and this past semester was extremely tough. I just didn't have the time or energy to write. But we're in the home stretch now with Seven Ways, so hang with me, folks. I'm back, and I fully plan to finish what I started, even if it takes until Christmas (incidentally, I'd originally planned to finish this story around Christmas 2010 – just look how that turned out)._

_I apologize for any punctuation errors in this chapter. I caught a few that happened when I switched word processors, but I'm sure I didn't catch them all._

* * *

Over the next four days, not a single student in the Ouran Institute had not heard at least one version of the story of Hikaru's capture. While most retellings were exaggerated to include such heroic acts as Hikaru throwing himself at the guard or getting bodily dragged out of the library, most were at least partially accurate, and Hikaru was quickly going down in Ouran history as a hero; a fearless pioneer, sacrificing himself for the cause of scouting out enemy territory (and not to mention stepping in front of a proverbial bullet for the most popular boy in school).

_Are we thinking about the same guy?_ Haruhi couldn't help but wonder to herself. It seemed impossible that rude, selfish, immature Hikaru Hitachiin could ever be considered some kind of savior, but Haruhi supposed that there had to be at least a little good in everybody. Hikaru's had just waited until now to show.

But when the fifth day came and went and Hikaru had not returned, the mood shifted from triumph to concern, and quickly to a simmering uneasiness that spread like an illness. His belongings were still thrown about in the room he shared with Mori, as though his return should be expected at any moment. Teachers noted his absence with nonchalance, as if he was simply suffering from a head cold. But amongst the students, tensions were higher than ever.

"Damn it, I can't stand being so useless." Kaoru jabbed his fork through the chicken on his plate, and it made a grating screech on the ceramic beneath. "I swear, if they've laid one hand on him someone's getting a slow, painful death."

"Death by hallucination?" Kyouya asked, amused. "I wouldn't mind seeing that." For the first time since Haruhi had known him, there were the makings of black circles beneath his eyes. It was unnerving.

Kaoru scowled. "Did I look like I was talking to you?"

Kyouya swirled around the contents of his teacup. "Seeing as how you were addressing the table as a whole, I felt it was fully within my right to express my opinion."

Haruhi was trying her hardest to tune them out, focusing instead on the chatter around her and the headache starting to prickle at the nape of her neck. But after several minutes, the tension was too stifling, and she rose from the table. There were two hours left before curfew, and she decided that they would best be spent in the library, far away from any of the boys.

To her annoyance, as soon as Haruhi turned to leave the table, she heard the scraping of another chair behind her.

"Hey, I'm coming with you!" Renge smoothed out her skirt and clumsily shoved her chair back under the table. "Wait just a second."

"Hold on, I'm leaving too." Two seats down from Renge, Kasanoda was also pushing in his chair. Haruhi was apparently not the only one who had noticed the painfully tense atmosphere.

"Some argument, huh?" Renge asked as soon as she caught up with Haruhi, a slouching Kasanoda at her heels.

Haruhi frowned. "I've never seen Kaoru like that before. It was kind of weird."

Renge looked surprised for a moment, and then her face settled into an expression of matronly understanding. "Ah, I keep forgetting you haven't known them as long as we have.

Kasanoda rubbed the back of his neck. "Whoever said Kaoru was the gentle one needs to check their sources. Once you get them angry they're pretty much the same person."

This was news to Haruhi, and it made her feel a bit cheated. She had assumed that, out of all of the Hosts, she'd gotten to know the twins the best. In particular, she was actually quite fond of Kaoru. But after all, he had been raised alongside Hikaru for fifteen years; they were bound to share some personality traits.

"Yeah, Kaoru can be pretty cool," Renge went on, "but he has a berserk button. Threaten his brother and you're gonna see some blood get spilled."

Haruhi raised her eyebrows. "I hope you don't mean that literally."

But Renge didn't seem to hear her. "I think it's sweet, personally. That kind of brotherly devotion deserves a medal."

"Something like that," Kasanoda muttered.

They reached Renge's room first, and with a breezy wave she slipped through the closed door. The hallway suddenly seemed much quieter.

Kasanoda cleared his throat. "You, um, seem pretty calm about this whole thing."

"What whole thing?" Haruhi was not paying attention; instead, her eyes were focused on the picture windows. More bars had cropped up in the past couple of days, and the sight made her legs feel weak.

"I mean about Hikaru," Kasanoda corrected, his face flushing. "You've really kept your cool. It's... cool."

Haruhi felt the edge of her mouth twitch upward, though she couldn't muster a full smile. "Well it's not like arguing and freaking out about it is going to help him," she said, which warranted a strange look from Kasanoda.

"You don't mean..." He stopped walking, and looked down at Haruhi with a sort of strangled concern. "You aren't going to try and do something, are you?"

Haruhi chewed on her lip. What she wanted to say was, _No, I hadn't meant it like that. Stop worrying_. But somewhere in her gut, she felt a strange stirring, like some unspoken emotion was trying to worm its way out. Keeping her mouth shut tight, Haruhi shook her head, hoping that her troubling train of thought wasn't evident on her face.

"O-of course not," she finally stammered. "Whatever happens, happens. No point in getting myself in trouble too, right?"

But as she spoke, the feeling in her stomach grew stronger.

Kasanoda looked her in the eye for a few seconds, and then let out a weary breath. They were reaching her room now, and he took a step back while Haruhi fiddled with the lock. "Just be careful, okay?" he said quietly. "Don't do anything too rash."

Haruhi put on her brightest smile. "Relax, okay? You don't have to worry about me."

For a few moments Kasanoda looked like he was about to argue, but then the expression on his face turned into one of resignation. He gave her a weak smile and said, "See you tomorrow, Fujioka."

"See you."

And with that, the boy shoved his hands in his pockets and slouched off down the hall. Haruhi slipped inside her dark room and closed the door behind her. With her hand still on the knob, she counted down from three hundred.

And when she reached zero, she turned the knob and stepped back out into the hall.

* * *

Curfew was still forty-five minutes away, but the school was already eerily still. The maze-like halls were dim and dusty, and more than once Haruhi caught herself gasping at a sudden creak of the floor. She clutched her math notebook in her arms, shakily prepared with an excuse about getting lost on the way to help a friend with homework, lest she get caught. But the whole way to the third floor, she met no one.

It had been weeks since she had been up here. If anything, the changes on the third floor were even more drastic than those in other parts of the building. Entire hallways had been blocked off with makeshift walls and metal doors, and some of the windows were covered not with bars, but with metal plating. This floor was still being used for dorm rooms and classrooms, which could only mean one thing.

Whatever was on the fourth floor now was being given the highest security possible. There was no way she was getting within a hundred feet of the fourth floor stairwell, not if the entire third floor looked like this.

Haruhi rubbed at her eyes. She was getting a tension headache, and the flickering lights were not helping. She knew that she should just go back to her room, go to bed, and hope for the best. That was the safe thing to do.

But for the first time in her life, Haruhi was tired of doing the safe thing. And that, above all, scared her. That feeling in her stomach, the strange stirring instigated by Kasanoda's words – Haruhi was beginning to realize what that had been.

She blinked hard a few times, and rubbed at her temples. No one else was going to try to figure this out – Kyouya was milking the situation for whatever information he could, and all of the others either didn't care at all, or were too busy passing the blame to try and do something about it. Haruhi wished to no end that she could feel that way right now; that she could ignore the higher duty that was beginning to tug on the back of her mind, and just go live her own life. To hell with destiny and prophecies and all of this crap.

It was at this moment that something – a murmur of noise – pulled her out of her thoughts. By the time she recognized two voices just around the corner, she had only seconds to hide. Her heart pounding in her ears, Haruhi ducked behind a velvet drape, choking on the resulting dust cloud, and tucked herself into the darkest corner she could manage. The voices sifted into clarity, and Haruhi held her breath.

"... started to wake up this morning. That doc's got some strong stuff, though. Knocked him right back out."

"What've they found?" The first voice was unfamiliar, but the second definitely belonged to Kosmin.

"Nothing. Test results'll take awhile to be read and all."

The two men were nearly to Haruhi's curtain by now, but she had entirely forgotten about hiding. She felt sick to her stomach.

"They gonna keep him up there till then?"

"Don't know. Don't think anyone knows, except maybe the Boss."

"Hope they keep that one alive. He was a hoot when they first brought him in. Socked Zev right in the nose."

There was the soft, final click of a door closing, and the voices faded into a hum. Haruhi was frozen, her fists balled up in the fabric of her sweater, biting her lip to keep from making noise. She was feverish with anger; her chest burned, her stomach froze. Her hands shook, no matter how she clenched them.

All at once, she wished that she had not heard a thing.

Her thoughts began working again in phases. At first she could process her anger and her disbelief. Then, the murmur of guilt.. Finally, a resolution: she had to tell someone. She had to tell someone immediately. It didn't matter if they didn't care. It didn't matter if they scoffed and fought and threw insults around. Someone's life was on the line, and if they couldn't all get along, it was time to pose as a team and make something happen.

Haruhi did not realize her feet were moving until she was halfway to the grand staircase. It was still fifteen minutes before curfew, but the halls were deserted. She did not hear a whisper of noise, until she reached the mouth of her hallway. Just as she turned the corner, headed resolutely towards Tamaki's room, someone called her name.

"Hey, I've been looking for you all over!"

Haruhi looked over her shoulder, and her brow twitched with impatience. It was Shiro, the new kid.

"I don't have time to-"

"No, no!" He bounded up to match her pace, and she could see that his eyes were rimmed with red. "It's really important. You have to listen to me!"

Haruhi groaned, rubbing a fist across her eyes. "Make it quick." She paused, standing with her shoulder against the wall.

Shiro took a deep, shaky breath, and then launched into his story. "You know how I mentioned that my mom was sick?"

Haruhi made a noncommittal grunt.

"She was supposed to have some kind of treatment two weeks ago, and my grandfather said he'd call when they found out if it worked." His voice was hoarse and wavering. "But we aren't allowed to get letters or anything anymore, so I don't know what's going on back home, and it's really starting to make me worried, and I was just hoping that maybe... maybe you could help..." He trailed off, folding into himself.

"What do you want us to do about it?" Haruhi tried to sound gentle, but reality was clear and bitter in this case. She did not want to get the boy's hopes up.

"I don't know!" Shiro wailed. "Steal the phone, find where they keep the mail, help me get out of this place – _something_!"

Three very unlikely options, but Haruhi couldn't think of anything better. Her headache was beginning to pound at the back of her eyes again. This was not the time to be dealing with this.

"Why don't you go find Kyouya? He can help." Total lie.

Shiro sniffed loudly. "Where is he?"

Haruhi rattled off the room number, then gave Shiro a small, forced smile. "Don't worry, we'll do something about it. We all know how you feel." And with a light pat on the shoulder and a quick "Good luck", she turned her back on the boy and continued down the hall. Her body felt heavier with every step, and by the time she reached her room, she felt as though she was sinking slowly to the floor with guilt.

The room was empty; Haruhi made a note to thank divine providence for that. She slung her coat down in a chair and trooped into the bathroom, tying her hair up as she went. She slammed the door behind her, turned on the tap with too much force, and made sure to stomp with every step she took. Still, the burning anger did not leave her veins. She had no idea how she was going to convince the boys to take action, and time was not stopping for her to figure it out. One half of her mind tried to tell her that it would be fine – they would all come together soon, once they realized what grave danger Hikaru was in. But the other half, the logical half, knew that this was never going to work. The Hosts were too divided, and not even Haruhi would be able to change their opinions.

It was this half of her mind that first came up with the plan.

* * *

Haruhi had not been back in the library since the fiasco, but she could still imagine the smell of wool and the echo of Kaoru's shouts. It seemed like weeks ago – not a mere few days.

The room was empty, save for the two customary guards by the double doors. Their eyes were trained on Haruhi from the moment she entered the library. All she had to do was use her powers once, maybe twice, and _bam_ – the guards would be on her like ants. She'd be upstairs in minutes, and then...

That would be the hard part, of course. Getting caught was easy. But getting out?

Haruhi stretched her fingers. She knew what she could do. She had collapsed a building before, and she could do it again. It was going to be fine. It was going to go perfectly.

So why was her heart pounding in her fingertips?

She started on the lower shelves, making a show of pulling out books, examining the spines, and murmuring to herself. The fabric bindings hissed as she slid them in and out, and besides the shuffling of her shoes, it was the only noise in the room.

"So when was I gonna find out that I volunteered myself for Kyouya's super secret mission?"

Haruhi dropped the book she was holding, and it plunged to the floor with a dusty thud. Still trying to catch her breath, she whirled around to see a pair of angry hazel eyes looking up at her.

"Well?" Hunny prodded, leaning against the bookshelf. "Kyouya said it was your idea, so I figured you'd probably know how my name got offered up to pretty much risk death for this brat."

Haruhi pressed one finger to her lips. "Shut up, the guards can-"

"-hear absolutely nothing," Hunny finished. "You can thank me for that."

But that was still less than assuring. Slamming her book back in the shelf, Haruhi grabbed Hunny by the wrist and headed for the double doors. "We're talking about this upstairs. I don't know where you get the idea that I told him-"

"From Kyouya himself." Hunny snapped his fingers lightly as they passed the guards. They slipped out the doors without incident, and continued across the lobby. "He came to our room and was pretty much like, 'Here's Haruhi's idea, you're gonna do it, go ahead and write your will.'"

Haruhi groaned and rubbed at her temples. "I never even mentioned you. I just told Shiro to talk to Kyouya, that's it."

Something flashed in Hunny's eyes, but his harsh tone did not soften. "Well I'm not doing it."

"Of course you aren't." Haruhi felt the start of something raw and rough welling up in her chest. "Because if you did it, you'd be helping someone else for once, and Heaven forbid you should ever do something like that." She was surprised to see that Hunny looked hurt by her words, but she felt no guilt. "Just once, maybe you could think about someone other than yourself! Shiro's mother is sick, maybe even dying, and you won't stop thinking about your own safety long enough to help him out. Well in case you don't remember, we all knew there would be risks when we-"

"_I don't want to die!" _

Haruhi's vision went black with the energy of his outburst, and she stumbled at the thredshold of the dorm room door, her key clattering to the floor. She could hear Hunny breathing heavily behind her, but when her vision filtered back, she was surprised to see a sheen of tears around his eyes.

"... What?"

Hunny wiped his face, staying firmly in the doorway. Backlit by the lamps from the hall, his face was only half-visible. "You heard me. I don't want to die. And especially not for some stupid kid."

Gingerly, Haruhi tugged him into their room, shutting the door behind him. "And who says you're going to die?"

Hunny looked up at her, deathly serious. "They want us dead, Haruhi. Just look what's happened to Hikaru."

Haruhi could hear the echo of Kosmin's voice in her head, but no sooner had she opened her mouth than there was a rapid knocking on the door. Not daring to meet Hunny's eyes, she trudged over to answer it.

Renge's face was stark white, her hair still wet and stringy from a shower, and when she spoke it was with a nervous stammer.

"You guys gotta come quick!" She motioned down the hall. "Right now!"

Dazed, Haruhi stepped out of her dorm. "Why?" She wasn't sure she could stand anymore bad news.

But a weak smile broke out on Renge's face. "Hikaru's back."


End file.
